


keep on building on the ground

by Stratisphyre



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Aziraphale is ineffably British, Deliberate baby acquisition accidental parenthood, Fallen Angel Aziraphale (Good Omens), First Time, Fluff, Getting Together, Kid Fic, M/M, Minor Violence, Wine, love letter to wine, so much wine, well not so much fallen as having taken a large step sideways
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-13
Updated: 2019-10-25
Packaged: 2020-12-14 14:08:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 34,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21017030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stratisphyre/pseuds/Stratisphyre
Summary: “I… suppose… you could stay,” he finally murmured. He scraped his teeth over his tongue, as though he’d tasted something nasty. It stuck in his cheeks, even. “This is not a kindness,” he growled at the baby. “This is pure, unadulterated self-interest! I’m going to raise you to lo—” He choked. “Lo— lov— fuckinglikethe world enough not to destroy it.”Having kidnapped the infant Antichrist, Crowley finds himself hunted by both sides eager for their war. Desperate, he turns to the only being on Earth who might be able to help him: a Fallen angel playing vintner in Provence.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Tomorrow is Canadian Thanksgiving, and this year I am thankful for the Good Omens fandom, lol. 
> 
> I haven't used exhaustive tags, so I'll make sure any relevant notes are included at the beginning of each chapter. If I've missed anything, please make sure to shoot me a comment so I can add them on. 
> 
> The title of this is from Queen's "Father To Son." As one does.
> 
> Please note this first chapter presents the attempted infanticide of the Antichrist as a jolly good romp.

Staring at the baby in the basket, Crowley was suddenly struck by how much he utterly hated and detested Hell. Heaven, too, though his hatred for Heaven was more a long-healed scar which only occasionally ached during poor weather. Hell, though… Hell was all tortured souls, other demons’ backstabbing attempts and far too much paperwork. Hell was the line up at a poorly-organized and understaffed DMV in the middle of Wisconsin, with marginally more screaming. Hell was the utter absence of any good thing. And Crowley enjoyed good things. His Bentley. His plants. Decent whisky. All set to disappear eleven years from now because of the little beast next to him.

He shifted his gaze to look blankly at the road ahead of him. Somehow, he knew calling his angelic counterpart would end with the same old song and dance it always did: a violent fight ending with one or both of them dead. The angel was exactly the sort of pillock who was probably excited for the blessed war to happen. He’d been talking up his own prowess in battle every time he and Crowley had crossed paths since he’d been assigned down to Earth. There was every chance that if Crowley approached him about diverting the Apocalypse, he’d try to kickoff proceedings early by trying to kill Crowley permanently, instead of forcing him through an extremely inconvenient discorporation. No. There wouldn’t be any help there.

The baby gurgled in his basket and Crowley leaned over the top. Cute little blighter, unfortunately.

There was no help for it.

The infant had to go.

Later into evening, Crowley reported in: he’d delivered the child without any fuss, and the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan and Lord of Darkness was squarely ensconced in the house of an American diplomat and his wife. It would buy him at least eleven years to figure out how to gently break it to Hell that the actual Antichrist was dead and buried. He’d left the poor thing in a full bathtub of water and simply walked away. And he absolutely wasn’t feeling any guilt over the matter. Not at all. He was a demon, and demons murdered helpless infants all the time. Or so he was led to believe by the posters and pep rallies.

The sound of running water had brought to mind the Ark; trying to square away every child he could find before the waters crept up and put them all out to sea. The angel had found him before he’d managed to do much more than pry off a loose board, and discorporated him with a single snicker-snack of his fucking sickle. When Crowley had managed to slither back up, the flood had happened, and none had survived.

He sat. Watched half an episode of Golden Girls. Stood. Paced. Once half an hour had passed, he propelled himself back to the tub. Half an hour, surely, would’ve been enough time. He steadied himself and reached down into the overly-full tub to lift the body out.

The baby let out a shrill cry the moment it surfaced, and Crowley leapt back, plunging the baby back into the water.

Looking incredibly put-out, the infant continued to cry under the water until Crowley retrieved him and dried him off. 

Well.

Not drowning then.

* * *

Over the next few days, Crowley discovered the following methods to be ineffective as well:

  * Piling too many pillows atop the baby, after placing him on his stomach, surrounded by overstuffed plush toys and crib bumpers—the exact opposite position to what the articles online recommended for infants. The crib itself had manifested quite helpfully. When Crowley had dug him out of the nest of hazardous softness, the baby had simply blinked awake as though he had been the best sleep of his young life.
  * Slipping a wee dram of cyanide into the baby’s bottle. Roughly twenty minutes later, the infant’s tummy gurgled unpleasantly. The result was the nastiest nappy Crowley had ever beheld—truly, something which merited a place in lower of the pits of hell, and Crowley miracled it right where it belonged.
  * His last, and most direct, attempt was dropping the baby from the window. The baby fell, bounced once, but hadn’t woken from his nap. Crowley was forced to retrieve him and wipe the memories of an inconvenient passer-by who’d seen everything.

(Crowley failed to appreciate an infants’ lack of understanding of the concept of mortality. For most babies, this doesn’t have much impact on their day-to-day rate of survival, which doesn’t bear close examination for obvious reasons. For the infant Antichrist, however, this unawareness of Death led to him being unable to die. Had Crowley known this, it would have saved him a week’s worth of frustration)

It all cumulated in Crowley, finally, settling into his favourite chair with the infant cradled in his arms, and trying to decide what to do next. As far as he saw it, he had two options, neither of which he was particularly keen on.

In the 1800s, back when he’d first set up shop in London, he’d arranged for a few acquaintances of his to illegally procure him some holy water. A handful of street urchins who cheerfully agreed to rob a church for a full five pounds to split between them. They’d managed within an afternoon, and handed it over in a wine bottle which Crowley stored away for his own protection. When they’d handed it over, the glass had burned Crowley’s hand down near to the bone—dried water on the outside apparently as effective as what was within—and the thought of using it on the infant made his hand twitch and ache. He opened and closed his hand out of habit, the thick scar tissue covering his palm and fingers flexing painfully. He wasn’t positive the holy water would do anything to the baby, but frankly the thought of finding out made him vaguely nauseous.

The other option, he thought as he gave the baby his early-afternoon bottle, was to starve the poor little beast. He tucked the baby up against his shoulder and rubbed his back to burp him. The baby, still a mostly inanimate blob stuck in an unending sleep-eat-shit cycle, nuzzled into him and let out a contented sigh.

Bless it all.

“I don’t know what the fuck to do with you,” Crowley finally admitted. The baby slept on peacefully, and Crowley shook his head at himself. He was a fucking demon. It shouldn’t have been hard to end this one, little life. Should’ve been easy as snuffing out a candle. And yet. “Either I’m rubbish at murder, or you’re rubbish at dying.” He'd never been one for murder. Not when there were countless preferable options that didn’t ruin one's clothes.

The baby slept on. A warm weight against Crowley’s chest. It was… peaceful. Nice. Crowley cringed even thinking the words. But the baby’s rhythmic breathing continued on, despite his best efforts, and eventually Crowley nodded off as well, infant still cuddled atop him.

_Tomorrow_, Crowley thought before he dropped down into sleep. _I’ll figure out a way to kill him tomorrow_.

Halfway through the night, the baby woke with a small wail, and Crowley eased them both up to go and fetch a bottle. The baby cried through the entire process of heating the water, measuring out the formula and checking the temperature, but settled the moment the nipple brushed against his lips.

“Fuck,” Crowley said, looking down at the baby as his eyes drifted shut halfway through eating. The nipple slipped from his mouth and he pressed his cheek against Crowley’s arm. “It’s not happening, is it?” There was no answer. “Then what in Heaven am I supposed to do with you?” Far too late to make the switch, obviously. And it wasn’t as though he could drop the Antichrist at some random Children’s Home and hope for the best. The entire world was at stake. _Crowley’s Bentley was at stake_. He had about as much desire for the Apocalypse as the average wanker on the street outside had for a unanaesthetized root canal.

Not for the first time, he wished his angelic counterpart was less of an absolute tit. Would’ve been nice to get some less demonic perspective on things. Perhaps even come up with a decent game plan which hadn’t involved kidnapping the infant Antichrist and then trying to figure out what the fuck to do with him.

The baby smacked his lips in sleep and mewled softly when Crowley repositioned him in the crook of his elbow.

“I… suppose… you could stay,” he finally murmured. He scraped his teeth over his tongue, as though he’d tasted something nasty. It stuck in his cheeks, even. “This is not a kindness,” he growled at the baby. “This is pure, unadulterated self-interest! I’m going to raise you to lo—” He choked. “Lo— lov— fucking _like_ the world enough not to destroy it.”

The baby was unmoved. And probably dirty again, judging by the rumbling coming from his bum.

Crowley narrowed his eyes. “Suppose I’ll have to pick up a few things, won’t I?” Because he hadn’t planned on keeping the little beast. Stopping by Tesco for the barest essentials did not cover a prolonged stay. He’d need… things.

Wondering what those things were, Crowley did the only logical thing and retreated to the internet. An hour later, he’d ordered well in excess of five thousand pounds’ worth of baby paraphernalia from Amazon.

* * *

Having resigned himself to keeping the infant, Crowley approached it as he had when he’d acquired the first of his houseplants, less the potting soil.

First, he decided, one needed to set expectations. Clear communication and immediate follow through. Discipline. And liberal use of the garburator. Not that the baby would fit in the garburator, nor did it bear thinking of, now that he’d decided to let the little beast live. However, examples could be made. He didn’t necessarily have to follow through on anything, as long as he was holding the threat of it over the infant’s head. Similar strategies had worked beautifully for him over the years; Dagon was still sending him regular blackmail material on other demons to avoid having her secret love of bath bombs get out. 

That evening, he decided to get the cards on the figurative table.

“Listen here, little beast,” Crowley said, fixing the infant with a scowl. “Here's how things work: you will sleep through the night and wake no earlier than seven. You will eat when and what I choose to give you as food. Any dissatisfaction with this arrangement will be suffered in silence. Do we understand each other?”

He needed, in short order, a sizable glass of something strong and something meaningless and stupid to take his mind off things. He’d set up the new bassinette in his bedroom, and when the door was ajar, he could hear the baby from anywhere in the flat. Which wouldn’t be necessary, as the baby would be sleeping through the night.

A spit bubble caught on the baby’s lower lip. Crowley took it as tacit agreement, and left the room.

The baby began crying only moments later.

Crowley re-entered the room and swept the baby up in his arms to bounce him, murmuring vile yet empty threats beneath his breath. It only took the baby a few minutes to settle, and Crowley eased him back into his bassinette.

"This was the exception that makes the rule, understand me?"

He went in search of his whisky.

There were three other exceptions that night. Eventually, morning found them both passed out on the couch, the baby peacefully sleeping on Crowley's chest.

Crowley's plants, especially a particularly difficult Vanda orchid currently staving off root rot out of fear alone, judged him in silence.

This would obviously require more drastic persuasion.

During one of the baby’s rare moments awake, Crowley carried him to the atrium. There was a particularly airheaded little jade plant whose existence he’d been prolonging for just such an occasion.

He glowered at it, cradling the baby in his left arm and tilting him up to give him a clear look at it.

"This greedy little bastard," said Crowley, "is a jade plant. As you can see from the boils on its leaves, it's suffering from oedema. And it's time for it to suffer the consequences."

The other plants looked on with shaking leaves as Crowley ferried the jade plant to the kitchen. He upended it into the garburator with extreme prejudice and grinned with delight as it was reduced to mulch.

"This," he informed the infant, "is what happens when rules are ignored."

The baby blinked slowly, nonplussed, and proceeded to fill his diaper with so much shit that it leaked out the sides and down Crowley’s arm. Crowley stared at the baby, forehead creased in bafflement. The plants hadn’t tested him in such an outrageous fashion since the umbrella tree had dropped its leaves all over the carpet and suffered dire consequences.

Crowley miracled away the dirty nappy and excess of shit, and winced when, instead of feeling clean, his skin still felt grimy, with a vaguely popcorn-smelling scent lingering in the air. It appeared that baby shit, along with certain other bodily emissions, needed to be scrubbed off the old-fashioned way.

“Perfect,” he muttered. “Bath time, then.”

The infant wept inconsolably when Crowley stripped him of his pajamas, and only settled when Crowley dipped him into the kitchen sink. There was only an few finger’s widths of water, and he used a soft cloth to gently stroke the little beast’s back, cleaning him as thoroughly as he could. His remained opened the whole time, surprisingly, and when Crowley eased him out he waved his fists up about his face as though he were celebrating his nascent victory over Crowley’s dignity.

“Right. My turn, I suppose.” One of Crowley’s innumerable online purchases had been a small, hammock-like bouncing chair, and he strapped the baby in before climbing into the shower himself. He couldn’t help constantly glancing out between the strips of frosted glass on the door; it wasn’t as though the infant was going anywhere, but that barely settled his nerves.

“Now,” he said, stepping out of the shower and pulling on his Egyptian cotton bathrobe. “We’re going to try this again.”

An upstart physicist was once misattributed to quote that insanity can be defined by doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. This quotation could actually be attributed to Crowley, who proclaimed it, loudly, over drinks one evening in 1976 after sticking a burning rag in his angelic rival’s gas tank and sending it barreling at top speed into a stone wall. Miraculously, no one else was harmed, the angel was begrudgingly discorporated, and had to begin the lengthy process of getting a new body.

“It’s always the same,” Crowley crowed to whoever happened to listen (fortunately, his audience was both extremely limited and extremely intoxicated thanks to the generosity of the angel’s stolen purse). “We keep up with this same song and dance, and it’s the same result every time. We get new bodies and come down and do it all over again. It’s absolutely barmy that we expect a different outcome at all.”

Someone had remembered it the following morning, despite their inebriation and subsequent hangover, and the quote appeared in a pamphlet for Narcotics Anonymous several years later, albeit more succinctly. By then, Crowley had mostly overcome his own hangover, had himself gone through the process of acquiring a new body, and forgotten all about it. Considering the enormous number of quotes that have been accredited to aforementioned physicist over the years, it’s shocking no one has proposed his involvement in certain select bibliographies of Dostoyevsky, Austen, and the Council of Trent.

All of this to say: had Crowley remembered his one-time wisdom, it would have saved him yet another week’s worth of frustration.

* * *

The internet was, in turns, the greatest tool ever invented, and Satan’s own hand manifested on the computer screen.

Crowley had a two-minute panic attack thinking that, somehow, the baby had contracted measles when small red spots broke out across his face. Crowley had never been vaccinated—was it even possible for demons to carry human illnesses?—and the idea of having somehow introduced some fatal disease to his little beast was horrifying. What else had he been exposed to over the years? Bubonic, pneumonic _and_ septicemic plagues. Smallpox, certainly; he’d received a mighty commendation for smallpox, which had brought him closer to vomiting than anything else that century. TB, obviously. He’d spent more than a few long weeks seated at scummy tables in smoke-filled poker houses. Probably not HIV, though not for want of Effort. Who knew what else?

He stumbled on the answer by accident, his lips still curled by the idiocy touted by some of the other parents railing against vaccinations.

“Baby acne,” he decided. An entire afternoon’s worth of perfectly respectable stoicism wasted by a few little pimples. "Well, seems you're not dying. Just ugly." The baby yawned and Crowley absolutely did not find it in anyway adorable. "Well, spotty anyway."

Once he’d gotten the baby asleep for the evening, he returned to the computer for a few minutes. Shortly thereafter, the entire cadre of anti-vaxxers from the message board discovered they needed to reset their passwords when they logged in—an irritation which would plague them every time they logged on for the next year.

Purely by coincidence.

* * *

Crowley, unlike most new parents, did not require sleep. He enjoyed it, certainly. There wasn’t anything else like a quick day’s kip. The baby seemed to agree, sleeping often throughout those first couple of weeks. Crowley would find a spot near one of his windows and lounge about in the sunlight, dozing off with the baby on his chest until one of the little beast’s trilling little cries would wake him in time for another bottle. The baby was better than a hot water bottle, albeit somewhat louder at times, and seemed happy to spend hours at a time asleep on Crowley’s chest, content. Crowley wasn’t used to this sort of peaceful quietude. Wasn’t really any such thing in Hell.

When the baby was awake, Crowley took to narrating their day. And, when he had nothing to say, they’d relax together; baby braced on his chest, or in his little hammock chair, listening to some of Crowley’s favourite music or Crowley’s acerbic recital of popular children’s literature.

“You should listen to this Cat fellow,” Crowley told him, looking under the edge of the book to peer at the infant on his chest. Little blighter was rubbing his forehead against Crowley’s collarbone, mouth opening and closing as though he was as shocked at the liberty as Crowley was. “Seems a proper villain. Could learn a thing or two.”

His face twisted up in a disgusted moue when he realized he was supposed to be _discouraging _rampant destruction of personal property. With a glower, he tossed the book to the side and grabbed up a different one.

“There was one little baby, who was born far away…”

Much better. A bit twee, but nothing in the world was perfect.

He surprised himself that evening when he realized he was humming as he fixed up the bottle. A softer, almost lullaby-like hum of “People Are Strange.” He stopped it immediately and the baby wiggled unhappily in the silence.

“Fine,” he snapped, gently tapping the baby’s lips with the nipple until he opened his mouth. He started humming again, bouncing around in place as the baby’s eyes began drooping shut. “But if you think I’m putting up with any of that drivelly kids’ shite, you’re out of your gourd.”

The baby expressed no opinions one way or another. Good. He was malleable. Crowley would be blessed if he was going to spend the next eleven years listening to the fucking Wiggles.

Eleven years. He froze, and the bottle slipped out of the baby’s mouth. He’d committed himself to raising the fucking Antichrist for eleven fucking years. And not only raising him, but raising him _well_. Like a proper parent.

Running on autopilot, he hadn’t realized he’d burped, changed and swaddled the baby up until he was hovering over the bassinette, fiddling with the elephant-themed mobile until he was blinking himself back to the present.

“I suppose there could be worse things,” he muttered, keeping his voice low. “Like the end of the world, for example. Big fan of existence, me. So much to enjoy about not being trapped in Hell or murdered by some white-winged bellend with a superiority complex.”

He tucked a loose cotton sheet up around the baby and dimmed the lights with a flick of his fingers.

And then stood there, staring down at the infant.

When the baby woke up three hours later, smacking his lips and looking for another bottle, Crowley was still there. And would be there, he realized. Until either existence ended, or his little beast could take care of himself properly.

It wasn’t such a terrible thing, now he thought of it.

* * *

The first week of September found them ambling through St. James, Crowley pushing an appropriately high-end pram through the park and pausing only occasionally to check to make sure the baby was still bundled up and warm. The pram was lined, of course, but he looked terribly small in it, swaddled up in his favourite green blanket.

There hadn’t been any word from Hell, which Crowley took to mean they hadn’t questioned his report stating the swap to have been successful. There were no demands filtering through his car’s speakers, no shite-covered pieces of parchment appearing on his desk, nothing much of anything really. As though they’d forgotten about him entirely in their overeager preparations for Armageddon.

“We’ll show them, won’t we?” Crowley asked. He leaned over to readjust the baby’s hat. It had a crooked look to it. Baby hats. Dreadfully important. Crowley’d even managed to find one with embroidered snakes. His little beast was still mostly in the throes of his sleep-eat-shit routine, but his eyes had been fluttering open more often these days, hence the walk through the park. The baby books Crowley suggested short constitutionals were good stimulation. St. James might’ve been more crowded than he generally preferred, but it had ducks. And, well. He had to get his jollies somewhere.

He was in the midst of dunking a particularly fat drake when a chill crept down his back, accompanied by the smell of geranium and an ethereal being’s obnoxious self-righteousness.

“Still showing up where you’re unwanted, Crawly?”

Of course, the fucking angel would show up.

“Crowley,” Crowley corrected by route. He straightened and placed himself between the angel and the pram. “Thought you preferred to avoid crowds.”

Flosiel had what an American might generously call an incredibly punchable face, squeezed out the top of a too-tight powder blue turtleneck. His bright eyes, the colour of spun seaglass, sparkled to make the unwary want to confide in him, and his chocolate brown hair was in a perpetual state of slicked-back perfection, aching for someone to deliver a quick right-hook to mess it up.

The angel gestured to the other side of the water, where a sidewalk preacher was screaming the good word at the top of his lungs, condemning practically every passerby as they did their best to ignore him. “Inspiring penitence.” Flosiel smirked. He was terrible for smirking. Probably couldn’t genuinely smile. And his smirk was nothing compared to Crowley’s, for all he practiced it more often. “Then I saw you and knew I had to come and give my respects.”

‘Respects.’ Funny thing. At this point in most of their conversations, they’d generally tried to discorporate each other. Considering Flosiel had gotten the drop on him, Crowley had to assume he wanted something.

“Anyone taking the time to stop and listen?”

“They will.” It sounded closer to threatening than hopeful. “What’s in there?”

“It’s a pram,” Crowley pointed out. “What do you think’s in it? A turnip?”

Flosiel craned his neck to look over Crowley’s shoulder and Crowley automatically moved to block his view. The baby didn’t emanate evil (when his bum was clean), but there was an obvious something about him when one knew how to look.

“Is that it?” Flosiel demanded, practically salivating. He all but licked his lips. Not surprising, exactly… he and Crowley had been exchanging unpleasant discorporations for five millennia, and Crowley was confident that even now the prig was imagining how to make it permanent during the Final Battle.

“Piss off,” Crowley finally snapped.

Flosiel frowned. “The only reason I’m not putting my blade between your ribs at this very moment is because it might disrupt the delivery.” His frown shifted from something irritated to considering. “HO said it was to have been delivered last month, come to think of it.”

“Well, you know me. Always procrastinating.” He nudged the pram back and scanned the area for the quickest escape.

Flosiel took a step forward, close enough to let Crowley smell the geranium of his breath. He’d never be over how much he fucking hated geranium; every time he smelled it, it preceded a painful temporary death. “No one would procrastinate over this.”

“No one angelic. Demons procrastinate over everything. Even the bit with the apple was a whole month late.”

Flosiel’s frown disappeared into sudden understanding, and he reached into his coat, where Crowley knew he typically kept his blessed weapon. “Oh, Crawly. What have you done?”

Crowley bolted. Snatched the baby up out of the pram and hightailed it out of the park, putting as much distance between himself and Flosiel as possible.

“Fucking shit,” he hissed. This wasn’t good. It was only a matter of time now before word got back to Hell; they were all so bloody eager enough for the Final Days even interoffice cooperation would be encouraged to make it happen. The one thing they could all agree on was how much they were looking forward to killing each other, and Crowley was now squarely in the way of it.

Despite his desperation, he eased the baby into his car seat, carefully doing up the straps before rounding the car and jumping into the front seat. Where the Heaven could they go? They’d be sought out. Hunted. And Crowley was going to end up in a bathtub full of holy water if they were caught.

Flosiel knew about his flat in Mayfair, though as with Flosiel’s poncy art gallery, it was supposedly off-limits. They’d gone through half a dozen living spaces before tacitly agreeing to stop discorporating each other in their own homes. But this was so far beyond the pale he daren't return.

He was half out of London, abandoning his flat and all the essentials inside, before he realized where the Bentley was taking them.

He stopped at a grocer’s along the way to collect a few things to see them across the Channel: extra nappies, a three-pack of dummies, bottles and a mobile bottle warmer, enough formula for a month, and a stuffed hedgehog. Thus armed, he aimed them towards France.

Specifically, to a small winery in Provence, wherein lived the only other being in the world who might be able to help him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mild warning for my hugely pretentious love of wine beginning to seep into things. 
> 
> Side note: I fully believe that Crowley swears more as he hasn't had Aziraphale as a mitigating influence in his life to this point. Sure.

In 1992, Wine Spectator broke its edict of only writing about wines which were easily accessible to its readers. The writer was a young woman who had recently returned from a backpacking excursion across Europe, eager to extol the many virtues of the small-yield vineyards she’d come across. The smallest yield of which came from Château de l'Ange Abandonné, one of the oldest family-run vineyards in France, and responsible for only five hundred cases a year, none of which were available for purchase to the public.

_I am confident,_ she wrote, _that within next decade, rosé wines will enter the market with the same distinction their white and red counterparts currently enjoy, as during my visit to Château de l'Ange Abandonné, I was treated to the most sublime tasting experience of my entire life._

This, she informed her editors, was not an exaggeration. No, she had not brought back any bottles (a small white lie), and they would have to either take her word for it or go seek out the winery themselves.

Deciding upon the latter of the two options, two of the more intrepid of the Wine Spectator editorial team undertook their own pilgrimage. When they returned, they allowed her article to run unedited.

_Made predominantly of a blend of cinsault and grenache, with the smallest hint of mourvedre, the 1982 rosé from this extraordinary vineyard brings notes of ripe wild strawberries, tart cherries and gentle citrus notes which reminded me of candied lime peel. There is a mysterious undertone of white pepper throughout, enough to make a person salivate when taken with the brilliant acidity and fleshy tannins. I was shocked that a rosé could age as well as this one, the first of many surprises from this incredibly small-batch family vineyard. It is heartbreaking to know the vintner—the umpteenth great-grandson of the original owner—rarely sells his bottles. While a traveler may occasionally find themselves treated to a tour of the vineyard, the hours during which it is open to the public are frustratingly vague, and almost impossible to decipher. If one is lucky enough to manage to catch the owner in a generous mood, they are treated to a full tour of the chateau, the vineyards, a flight of their spectacular wines, and a bottle to take home. I was gifted with a bottle of this year’s rosé, which I intend to bottle age at least ten years before I even dare to imagine the sort of special occasion which might entice me to open it. _

The article drew larger crowds to the Château de l'Ange Abandonné, the majority of whom were turned away politely but firmly by the vintner.

“So much to do,” he hummed pleasantly at them, “It’s only me here, I’m afraid.” He did, occasionally, pay some of the children and underprivileged persons in the nearby town to assist with his harvest, but only during the years where the local economy could use a small boost. Otherwise, the harvest of his modest three acres was done entirely by hand. Miraculous, really, that it always came together for him.

Tourists looking to put a notch in their well-traveled belts and tick off Château de l'Ange Abandonné as nothing more than a point of pride never quite managed to arrive during the opening hours described on the tidy handwritten sign set on the entrance gate. The world-weary, looking for a small glass of wine and a few hours’ reprieve, were more likely to find themselves inside, settled in with a full flight, and a generous charcuterie board. Occasionally, young people such as the Wine Spectator writer, were allowed to stay overnight rather than endure the long walk to the village to look for accommodations. They would wake to a breakfast spread of homemade croissants, seasonal fruit, and jams and jellies made with and elevated by the vineyard’s wine and “a nice breakfast white.”

None of them, however impressed or disappointed they were by their visit, could ever recall much about the proprietor past an impression of incredible kindness, and passion for his craft.

“French oak,” he declared to one such soul, a full decade before Crowley arrived at his gate, “Versus American. It’s such a tricky subject. You know, back in 1776, I thought I remembered something about oak trees being grown in America and as soon as barrels became available over here, I thought… oh. Drat. I meant, my great-great-great-great… oh, never mind, then.” With a gentle nudge, the visitor completely forgot the conversation, save that French oak tended to result in silkier tannic structure, which better complemented some of the whites grown at the chateau.

In the years since the article had been published, the number of visitors had dwindled down to only a very few die-hard wine enthusiasts per year, and the chateau enjoyed a small renaissance of peace and quiet until one evening, during an unseasonal but thematically appropriate downpour, a black Bentley pulled up to the gates.

Crowley could’ve easily miracled them open, of course, but he hesitated. Flosiel, the clotpole, refused to refer to anything Crowley did as a ‘miracle’ and cried out against demonic tainting of the word while shoving his sword right through Crowley’s gut. What if the vintner was the same? What if Crowley had come here on a fool’s errand?

In the backseat, the baby murmured unhappily. Their last stop had been Lyon a little over an hour previous, and he had slept right through Crowley’s attempts to give him a bottle. With a wave of his hand, Crowley miracled his nappy dry. It wouldn’t go terribly far to ease his little beast before disgruntled murmurings turned into a full-fledged fit.

“All right,” Crowley muttered. He leaned back to reposition the baby’s dummy. “I’m going in.”

Temporarily appeased, the baby decided to wait patiently as Crowley stepped out of the car, was immediately soaked, and made his way to the gate. There wasn’t any sort of intercom—that would’ve been far too easy—but to the right of the gate itself was another smaller door to permit foot traffic. When Crowley tried it, he was relieved to discover it unlocked.

The being who presided over the vineyard was an unknown element; Crowley hadn’t crossed paths with him since the Garden. His impression then had been one of delighted interest in the angel who had given his sword away. When he’d met Flosiel half a millennium later, the angel had laughed when Crowley had asked after the former Guardian of the Eastern Gate and. Right before smiting Crowley down to Hell, Flosiel claimed the other angel had been banished from Heaven for ‘unspeakable’ offenses. Since then, with Flosiel assigned to thwart his every wile, Crowley had done little more than keep tabs on the vintner’s whereabouts. It had become easier when he’d settled down into the vineyard permanently, but Crowley had never approached him. There had never been a reason to, despite his former delight. Until now.

The chateau itself was both grand and modest all at once. Not as large as some of the old manor houses dotting the countryside, but even through the rain Crowley could tell it was well-kept. There was a single light on in one of the upper rooms, and Crowley braced himself before, finally, knocking.

“Before you discorporate me,” he said as the door opened, “I have an infant in the car who needs a bottle.”

Aziraphale, the Fallen angel who never quite managed to find his way down to Hell, regarded him with wide-eyes. “Is that you Crawly?” His clothes brought to mind an anachronistic French peasant; billowy sleeves and knee breeches, a thick leather vest. All he was missing was a wide-brimmed sun hat.

“Crowley,” Crowley corrected automatically. He cringed and braced himself to get a joyful smiting.

“Crowley. You’re soaked through,” Aziraphale said. “Please.” He waved a hand and the gates creaked open. The Bentley knew better than to force Crowley to walk back through the rain, and slid up the cobblestone drive until coming to a rest a few feet from them. “Come in. I’ll get you set up with a glass of my ’87 mourvedre.”

“The baby is the Antichrist,” Crowley all but shouted. Better to have them both in this with eyes open.

Aziraphale blinked slowly, and Crowley tensed to run.

“The ’58, then.”

Before Crowley registered what was happening, he found himself warm and dry, tucked into a sinfully comfortable armchair, with the baby cradled in his arms and gulping down the contents of a bottle with so little regard to air consumption that Crowley was already resigning himself to a spectacularly unpleasant night.

There was also a glass of wine next to his left elbow, and another occult being sitting in an identical chair across from him.

“Here,” Aziraphale said, offering out his arms. “Poor dear. You look absolutely knackered.”

“You…” Crowley paused. “You won’t do anything, will you?” This was his last resort. And, perhaps, a part of Crowley wondered if it wouldn’t be easier for Aziraphale to snap his fingers and solve the problem for Crowley permanently. But despite everything, Crowley found himself preparing to fight the Fallen angel before him. He and Flosiel had killed each other across six of the seven continents, and he was sure he could take the soft-looking ex-angel on.

A shadow passed over Aziraphale’s eyes, and the comforting half-smile fell away from his face, though his expression drifted more towards bone-deep melancholy than any real affront. “No,” he whispered. “No, I wouldn’t hurt a child.”

After a moment’s careful consideration, Crowley handed over the baby with severe reluctance, but kept his hands free until Aziraphale propped the baby on his shoulder to gently pat his back.

Aziraphale gestured to the wine with his eyebrows. “Go ahead, dear boy.”

Crowley, still wary, reached for the wine. He generally didn’t go in for wine; he’d tried it, back when humans had first put it forward as something drinkable, and found it to be absolute rubbish. Hadn’t bothered with a repeat. But he needed something, and unless Aziraphale was hiding a decent bottle of scotch around somewhere, the wine would have to do.

He knew there was some archaic swirl-sniff-sip ritual, and given the sizable glass was only about a third filled, he supposed it was expected of him. He shoved his nose into the glass rather unceremoniously, and was immediately transported back to 1945, to a small bar outside of Berlin which had stubbornly survived the bombing. The smell of a woman’s perfume as she leaned over him to place a stein of beer down, the scent of dried violets hidden beneath the tobacco hanging in the air. Gravel ground into the tread of his boots, which he’d propped up on the table in front of him. A salvaged handful of blueberries crushed into a handkerchief and kept shoved against his breast.

He pulled it away and stared at it. “Is it always like this?”

“No, dear. The 1858 was a very good year for me. I’ve only a case of it left.”

The baby let out a substantial belch and Aziraphale pulled him away from his shoulder, cheerfully ignoring the small puddle of vomit left behind. “What a darling,” he cooed. “What’s his name?”

“Err.”

Aziraphale’s eyebrow twitched upwards. “They didn’t name him?”

“It was supposed to be up to the parents,” Crowley stated. “Something demonic. Like Damien. Or Wormwood. Or Apophis.” The nuns had probably convinced the American diplomat and his wife to go with something suitably stupid.

Aziraphale tutted. “None of those seem to suit.”

Crowley hadn’t thought so, either.

He finally took a sip of wine. The bar stayed at the forefront of his mind, and he found himself closing his eyes against the intense sense memory of it. There had been some sort of fruit growing outside the window, sweet smelling but left almost too long to pick, the full ripeness bursting across his senses when an easy breeze had blown the scent indoors. He let the wine sit on his tongue for a few, long moments, enjoying the way his cheeks tightened around the mouthful.

“Good?” Aziraphale asked.

“Very,” Crowley nodded, savouring another, slow sip. "Never been one much for wine."

“Excellent. I look forward to educating your palate.”

'Educating his palate'?! What a bastard.

Aziraphale stood, the baby tucked into his elbow. “Come along, then. I’m sure there’s a long story to tell about how you found your way here, but it can wait until you’ve gotten some proper rest.”

“I…” Crowley paused. Expressing gratitude sat like a stone at the back of his throat, but he supposed it was better than being turned out on his ear. “Thank you.”

Aziraphale offered a wan smile. “Think nothing of it. Come along, then. I don’t have a crib, but I’m sure we can miracle something up.”

Crowley, wine still in hand, trailed after him up a sturdy flight of wooden stairs to the second floor. The décor was something straight out of the Second Empire, all gilt-bronze fittings and fussy inlays. Charming, in their own way, though Crowley strongly preferred the stark modernity of his own flat. Aziraphale gestured to the door leading to his own bedroom and settled Crowley and the baby in their own room a few doors down.

“You should name him,” Aziraphale whispered, passing the baby—blissfully asleep—into Crowley’s arms. With a wave of his hand, a very surprised linen press shifted around into a serviceable bassinette, the contents within transforming into a soft-looking mattress.

Crowley settled the baby down. “I don’t…” he paused.

“We’ll speak in the morning,” Aziraphale told him, reading into the silence. He headed towards the door, tossing a soft, “and you can tell me how you came to kidnap the Antichrist,” thrown over his shoulder.

Crowley waited until the door closed behind the Fallen angel before pulling the bassinette within arm’s reach of the bed and collapsing to pass into restless sleep.

* * *

The storm raged throughout the night, and Crowley woke up to grey skies the next morning. The rain had calmed itself to a gentle pitter-patter, however, and when Crowley opened the door to his room he found everything he’d hurriedly piled into the Bentley stacked outside his door. He pulled out a fresh blanket sleeper to ward off the cold, sent another nasty diaper down spiraling down to join the others in Hell, and changed the baby with very little bother or fuss. He used the mobile warmer to heat up one of his small pre-made small bottles, and sat cross-legged on his bed as the baby ate.

Once the baby was fed, burped, changed, changed again, and happily waving his balled up little fists, Crowley had to admit to himself he was actively avoiding emerging from the small sanctuary of the borrowed bedroom. Aziraphale had been kind the night before, in the sort of way Crowley had long given up on expecting from Heaven, but would it hold through to morning? He had no idea where the Fallen angel's allegiances lay. Cast out of Heaven, but never quite made it to Hell. For all he knew, he was still working with the archangels, and all of Heaven’s host was waiting for downstairs. They’d kill him—permanently, he expected—and pass the baby back to Hell for placement with whatever hapless humans they decided would do the worst by the cuckoo dropped into their nest. Or perhaps Aziraphale had spent the whole of the night blessing buckets and buckets of water. Could he even bless water any longer? No demon Crowley knew could do so, but was Aziraphale a proper demon?

“He’ll have to drench me first,” Crowley promised the baby.

The baby bopped him on the nose, and Crowley decided it was time to stop hiding.

He emerged as the sun began peeking through the clouds, and followed the sound of movement from the lower floor. Details he hadn’t noticed jumped out at him now it was daytime. The lights inside were electric, but severely dated, and when he passed the bog it looked as though indoor plumbing had been an afterthought, Fifties-era trappings unceremoniously shoved into a space otherwise styled after certain bathing chambers Crowley had enjoyed during the reign of Queen Victoria. The home itself belonged to someone trapped in time who occasionally entertained humans with certain expectations of modern life.

On the main floor, he found Aziraphale bustling about the kitchen around more out-of-date furnishings. An impressively large wood-burning stove took up most of the eastern wall, two of its six burners already lit to heat the room. The kitchen itself was functional, but ill-decorated; exposed brick walls were covered with hanging crockery, and a large bay door looked out onto the vineyard. The majority of one wall was taken up by an open hearth; an empty space which must’ve once been used as an oven and was now stacked with Le Creuset cookware.

“Good morning,” Aziraphale said. “I trust you rested. You look less peakish.”

“I did,” Crowley said, still feeling slightly on-edge. He glanced around the kitchen for any open containers of water. Unless Aziraphale had blessed the contents of the small bowls of coffee on the table, they were probably in the clear. Crowley took the seat nearest the door and resettled the baby until he could reach out and take the coffee in hand.

“Ah, here.” Aziraphale placed a small plateful of thinly-sliced baguette down beside him. “Try dipping it. It’s jolly good.”

How someone who had lived in France since before Charlemagne had gotten his grubby hands over it managed to be so bafflingly British was a mystery.

The bread soaked up the coffee, and when Crowley slipped it into his mouth he blinked in surprise. It was… not terrible. And, more importantly, it was not blessed.

“Don’t eat often?”

“Barely at all,” Crowley admitted.

“I will admit,” Aziraphale said, settling into the seat across from him, both hands on the table, “I find good food to be one the more pleasurable of my vices. And since there’s not much to be had in the way of restaurants in this part of the country, I’ve mostly had to make due myself.”

Once he’d finished the odd coffee-bread combination, Aziraphale placed a tray of croissants and several small pots of jelly on the table for Crowley to graze through one-handed. Better rested, he found himself even more reluctant to pass the baby to the other being, but Aziraphale took it in stride instead of offense.

“I don’t want the world to end,” Crowley said, finally, after picking his way through most of a croissant and three of the different jams on the table. All of them had a pleasant undercurrent of wine, and he found the pinot noir-cherry to be his favourite. “When they asked me to deliver the baby, I went to the drop off point, made it look like I did, but then I just… didn’t. I told them I had, and it had all gone smoothly, but then I ran into Flosiel in London a few days ago and…” Crowley waved a hand. “All for nothing, I suppose.”

“No need to be defeatist,” Aziraphale replied. “No one has bothered me here in several centuries, and I doubt anyone will look for you here.”

“And if they do?” The baby squirmed and whimpered, and Crowley realized he’d raised his voice. He settled back down in his chair, patting the baby’s bum until he’d calmed.

“Do your best. It’s all anyone can do.” Aziraphale rose and rounded the table. Crowley tensed as the angel rested a hand on his shoulder. “Stay here as long as you want. With the harvest is in full swing, I shouldn’t have anyone stopping through until after the winter. Take a few months to collect yourself.”

Crowley took a steadying breath and inclined his head once. Sharply. A few months would be a reprieve from fears of Hell finding them. If Aziraphale was as hidden away as he said, it might be the only opportunity he had to catch his breath before they were discovered.

“Quite angelic, aren’t you?” he finally demanded mordantly, unable to quite allow himself to be anymore gracious in face of such generosity.

Aziraphale smiled, but it never reached his eyes. “I hope not.” He brushed a hand across the baby’s forehead. “I need to go and see to the vines. See if you can’t think of a name for him before I come back in for the evening.”

Crowley scowled at Aziraphale’s back.

“‘See if you can’t think of a name for him,’” Crowley repeated with a sneer. “The cheek of it. As though it’s hard to think of a name for a baby.”

The baby rolled his forehead against Crowley’s chest. He’d been doing that more often, lately, in an attempt to hold up his head. The first time, Crowley had a mild panic attack when he’d thought the baby had broken his neck in someway. Now it was practically a sign of affection.

“What do you think, little beast?” Crowley asked.

The baby screamed, a single sharp sound that trailed off into the warmth of the kitchen, and bonked his head against Crowley’s chest again.

“Good idea. Let’s think about it while we snoop around a bit, hmm?”

He stuck the last bit of croissant in his mouth and stood to explore the chateau. First, obviously, had to be the cellar. People—even occult ones—always kept their evils tucked away into the cellar. He found the door off the entrance to the kitchen, and a steep flight of concrete stairs sinking almost two floors into the ground, dimly lit by ancient bare bulbs. 

“What’ve we here, Richard?” Oh, oh definitely not.

He kept a tighter-than-necessary grip on the baby on the way down.

The evils were a long, long, loooong stretch of wine bottles and barrels, stretching back for well over a mile. Crowley blinked and shook his head. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected; the vineyard had been around almost as long as Hadrian’s Wall.

They made their way back upstairs to explore further.

“Think he’s hiding something in here, Zach?” Ooof, worse than Richard.

“What’s in the cupboard, Gregory?” Terrible.

“Jeremy, do you… No. I can’t even. You’re definitely not a Jeremy.”

“This must be his favourite room, eh Winston?”

He refused to admit defeat.

He and—“Friedrich? Ugh, I knew a Friedrich. What a twat,”—the baby moved the bottle warmer and some of the impressive store of formula down to the kitchen. He was drinking more formula less often, which was an encouraging sign when Crowley thought happily of sleeping through the night.

There were two other bedrooms upstairs. One was bare and impersonal, with a small cot lining the wall and not much else. The other was a bit warmer, with another expansive fireplace along the far wall. A thin layer of dust covered everything from the bed to the vestibule in the corner, and yet a small vase of green carnations near the window remained untouched by age. Crowley approached and peered at a small calling card propped up against it. It had faded with age, but he managed to make out the first name before it became completely unreadable. “What do you think of Sebastian?” The baby drooled all over his chest. “Right. Best not.”

They carried on through a small library filled with bookshelves over a third empty and a room with a large round table in the centre where Crowley imagined Aziraphale hosted travelers looking to try his wines.

“Ha. What about Vino?” He considered it for a moment. “Nah. He’ll think I’m trying to kiss his arse, won’t he?”

He paused as he passed into the back hallway, lit by the meagre light coming through the glass panes of the back door. Aziraphale had hung a very good print of Peter’s _Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden_ on his wall. Tucked back and away, of course, in a place of the house that felt empty. But still.

“Our Fallen angel has unexpected depths,” Crowley informed the baby.

A grin spread across his lips as his gaze moved from the painting to the baby and back.

When the angel returned in the evening, Crowley offered Adam up for inspection. With a more genuine smile than he’d seen since his arrival, Aziraphale lifted Adam into his arms, and waved Crowley into the kitchen for a late-night meal.

* * *

Aziraphale found, as weeks passed into a month, he had apparently adopted a pair of stray cats, rather than anything resembling houseguests. Crowley showed up for food once or twice a day, and then disappeared into the chateau with Adam cradled in his arms, completely out of sight until the next mealtime. Despite the transiency of the contact, it was… oddly pleasant to have company. Adam was a biddable infant, and Aziraphale rarely heard more than a whimper from him overnight. When he did, Crowley quickly shushed him, as though afraid anything louder than a whisper would see them instantly evicted. Aziraphale might’ve assured Crowley he had no such intentions, but the demon struck him as being rather slow to trust.

Crowley had smiled at him, once, when they’d met on the wall of the garden and Aziraphale had offered up his meagre protection from the world’s first rainstorm. Memories of his smile had seen Aziraphale through some difficult times, when smiles were hard to come by and kind words nowhere to be found. He hadn’t been carrying a torch, as it were, simply used it to remind himself that just as not all members of the Heavenly Host were truly righteous, not all denizens of the Fiery Pit were truly evil. Deciding how to communicate such sentiments to Crowley, however, felt next to impossible. Thus, Aziraphale left it all unsaid.

He’d been experimenting with late harvest for his viognier over the past few years, and it wasn’t until the first dusting of frost across the land he turned his attention to those vines. His reds were already tucked safely away in their barrels for the winter—French oak for his rosés, new American for his reds—but he waited to the very last moment before sweeping up his white. It would certainly be sweet, and after tasting a few of the slightly shrivelled grapes, he decided to add brandy. He hadn’t attempted anything fortified since 1962, and this year had been hot over the summer months. The white would probably hold up very nicely against the brandy if he wanted to try his hand at _vin de liqueur_ once again.

Mme. Marie LeGros, down in the village, happily agreed with him.

“Your father gave my mother a bottle of his fortified wine back when she was married,” Marie said. “She still talks about it.” It had been a lovely wedding, and Aziraphale had been happy to donate well more than one bottle to the occasion.

“I’m hoping it will turn out as fine as his did,” Aziraphale said.

“I’m certain it will,” Marie assured him.

She carefully packed up a few loaves of bread, fresh from their oven. Aziraphale preferred to make his own, despite the fine quality of Marie’s offerings, but the harvest had been time-consuming this year. He could miracle up weather good enough to allow him to finish in time, but he found that wines tasted better when the grapes were handpicked. And he couldn’t have anyone from the village stumbling across his house guest; he had a feeling Crowley would—what was the term?—shoot first.

Without being asked, she slipped in a lush-looking raspberry macaron religieuse. “In case you care to remember me fondly once it’s bottled.”

“My dear, it won’t be ready until your own children are born and married, surely.”

“An investment I’m willing to wait for,” Marie replied impishly.

“Well, should you happened to have a second one, then…”

She laughed and boxed another one.

He’d present them to Crowley after dinner that evening. Most nights, Crowley merely picked at the food as he fed Adam, and then disappeared again almost immediately. With the harvest was complete, perhaps he would deign to stay for longer than a few minutes.

Aziraphale prepared a veritable feast for them. Their past few weeks’ fare had been simple, in deference to Aziraphale’s attention to the harvest, but with the time for reaping now past, he could devote some much-needed attention to his new tenants. The fall had been good for the other farmers in the area, and he’d raided the marketplace quite thoroughly. Toothsome ratatouille and grilled veal loin, both accompanied by one of his lighter reds. He’d grown pinot noir through most of the early twentieth century, and still had a few bottles left that paired well. He enjoyed watching Crowley very carefully extricate a small bite of veal and eggplant, eyes lighting up when he tried it with the wine.

“’s good.” Crowley shrugged it off when he noticed Aziraphale’s scrutiny. “Eating’s always seemed unnecessary, really.”

“Unnecessary pleasures are often the most enjoyable,” Aziraphale said. He could only bear to watch Crowley struggle to balance Adam in his arms as he tried to navigate his meal before offering, “I’ll take him, if you want to take a moment to try some more.”

Adam had grown since their arrival, but still fit neatly into the crook of his arm. Crowley appeared less wary of allowing Aziraphale to handle his charge, but was still beset by reluctance whenever Aziraphale offered to take Adam off his hands. Aziraphale decided it was endearing rather than insulting. Whether Crowley knew he loved Adam was a subject of Aziraphale’s intense speculation whenever he was alone with his thoughts.

“Try it with some of the goat cheese.”

Suspicious but willing, Crowley did as instructed. Behind his spectacles, his brilliant serpentine eyes drifted shut, much as they had during their first evening when Aziraphale had placed a glass of wine in his hands and given him a moment’s worth of peace.

“That is…” Crowley paused.

“Tell me,” Aziraphale encouraged him. Crowley frowned at his wine glass, as though he wasn’t sure how. “Start with how it feels in your mouth. Does it dance on the tip of your tongue with sweetness? Make you salivate with its acid? How does it burn down your throat?”

“I…” He took a sip without a bite of his meal. “It’s making my mouth water.” Aziraphale gestured for him to continue. “It tastes fruity, but it isn’t sweet.”

“Good. Tasting notes of raspberry, black plums and mocha, I think. I aged this batch in old French oak to give the fruitiness a chance to express itself without fighting against stronger baking spices you tend to find in American. What else do you taste?”

“Licorice? Or anise seed. But only a bit.” Crowley blinked behind his glasses. “Is it odd it makes me think of rain?”

“Damp leaves,” Aziraphale nodded. “On the nose, at least. Try it with some of the tomato. It should complement the acidity.”

Crowley did as he suggested and took another sip. A small sigh escaped his lips. “This is…”

The moment was interrupted by a knock on the front door. The pounding was brusque and businesslike, and immediately put Crowley on edge. He kicked away from the table, reaching out for Adam with a desperate look in his eyes. Aziraphale’s lips thinned out in disappointment. He’d rather hoped they were past the instinctual fear the demon had of being betrayed. Apparently, his fears ran deeper than Aziraphale had guessed.

“I’ll see who it is,” he offered, standing. He passed Adam back to Crowley, who clutched the baby to his chest. “Eat some more, dear.”

He knew Crowley ignored him and expected the demon to trail after him to the kitchen door. If there was someone from either Heaven or Hell on the other side, Aziraphale decided, he’d have to do something drastic. He found the thought unintimidating; it wasn’t as though he could be banished from Heaven a second time.

Instead, perhaps fortunately, it was a human in an expensive but ill-fitting suit. He was a full foot taller than Aziraphale, with broad shoulders and a face best suited for radio.

“_Bonsoir. Es-tu perdu?_” Aziraphale asked.

The man pulled out his mobile and tapped at it a moment. Seconds later, a tinny female voice requested a case of wine in horrifically mangled French.

Aziraphale took mercy on both of them and replied in English. “I’m afraid my wines aren’t for sale by the case. And we’re closed for the winter.”

“What?” Ah. American. How predictable. “This is a vineyard, isn’t it?”

“It is.”

“Then shouldn’t you be selling your wine?” The man took a step forward, seemingly accustomed to his sheer physical presence getting him his way. “I hear your stuff is a good investment.”

Aziraphale’s face twisted in a moue of distaste. “I don’t believe in wine as an investment. It should be an experience.”

“What do you care what I do with it? Look, I don’t have a lot of time before my flight leaves…”

“Then you should be on your way. It would be unfortunate if you missed it.”

The man blinked, slowly, and then turned on his heel and returned to his car, left idling in the lane. Aziraphale’s nose wrinkled and he waved a hand to ensure the gate locked properly this time.

“You don’t sell any of it?” Crowley demanded.

Aziraphale jumped, having quite forgotten Crowley was there at all.

“Of course not,” he sniffed. “What would I drink if I sold it?”

Crowley huffed out a laugh, gracing Aziraphale with a real smile, and ferried Adam back to the kitchen.

“I can see why they want it,” Crowley offered, taking his seat again. He bounced Adam in one arm and picked up his wine glass with the other. “If all wine tasted like this, I’d definitely drink more.”

“I’ve had quite a long time to learn my craft,” Aziraphale said mildly.

Crowley sniffed. “What an understatement. Did you plant the first vines the second you settled in the area?”

“It took some time for me to decide what to do with the land, once I laid claim to it,” Aziraphale admitted. “I wanted to grow something. Put my hands in the ground. The soil ended up being perfect for wine.” He’d never worried about overworking the earth. Miraculously—hah!—it hadn’t been a concern.

Crowley returned his attention to the mostly-untouched glass in front of him. “If this is how good it gets, I don’t blame you.”

“Oh, my dear. It gets so much better.”

Crowley’s lips tilted upwards, and he raised his glass in a half-toast.

Long after dinner was finished, on his way to his bedroom and riding high on his victory in convincing Crowley to try one of Marie’s macarons, Aziraphale heard a low whimper coming from the room Crowley shared with Adam. He was used to such small sounds being immediately quieted, and blinked in surprise when it was followed by a sharp cry. He didn’t-not-rush to the door, knocking quickly but not waiting for a response before opening it.

Adam was awake in his bassinette, his small, furtive cries accompanied by waving fists. And Crowley, in his serpent skin, was tucked up all around him. The demon raised his head, glaring at the door with slightly-narrowed eyes.

“Poor dear,” Aziraphale whispered. He approached the cot slowly. “May I?”

Crowley hissed, but settled back down. Aziraphale picked him up. “Is he hungry?”

“Just had a bottle,” Crowley rumbled. “Gas, probably.”

“Poor dear,” Aziraphale repeated. He gently rubbed Adam’s back, giving it an infrequent but gentle tap to help alleviate some of his distress. “Do you often sleep like this?”

Crowley was remarkably expressive for a snake. “Easier to feel footsteps on the stairs this way.”

Their caller had thrown him more than Aziraphale had thought. There had to be a way to make Crowley feel safer in his home. Their home, Aziraphale supposed, though they’d only been with him for a short time.

Aziraphale gently bounced back and forth, falling into an easy rhythm. Adam’s cries eased back from full-lunged screams to gentle whimpers, his stomach gurgling unpleasantly.

He hadn’t realized he’d begun singing until Crowley asked, “What’s that? Asssssyrian?”

Aziraphale froze, his arms tightening around Adam. “I’m sure I don’t remember.” He continued on in silence until Adam finally passed back into fitful sleep. He placed the baby back in his crib, waiting until Crowley had tucked his long body back around the boy. “I want you to feel safe here, my dear.”

Crowley hissed out a sound which somehow managed to resemble a shrug. “Not bloody likely.”

Trying and failing not to feel somewhat hurt by the words, Aziraphale brushed the back of his fingers across Adam’s head and left him sleeping.

The night air in the chateau hung unpleasantly heavy around him as he made his way back to his room. While he’d been obliged to shoehorn in a number of modern conveniences for his occasional human visitors, his bedroom had seen little change since the house’s construction. Sleep never brought him comfort, and he mostly used the space to store clothing and books, and occasionally provide a cozy place to read in the evenings. A sizable stack of books sat next to his comfy wingbacked chair. The fireplace was already merrily burning away, warming the room, and making the bare walls seem less austere.

He sat and pulled open a book, staring at the words and occasionally flipping the page. He had a modest collection of volumes, his favourites from the ages, but the village never managed to establish a formal book merchant, and most of his collection had been garnered from his infrequent trips into Nice or Lyon. It was easier to ferry them back and forth once he’d acquired an automobile, but the days of economy of movement had curtailed what might have been an impressive assortment of literature and poetry, had he his way.

He was ten pages in when he realized he hadn’t read a thing.

“Drat,” he muttered, closing the book. Crowley’s simple acceptance of the fact nowhere would be safe for himself and Adam plagued Aziraphale’s thoughts. That there were no comforts Aziraphale could offer pressed a dull blade of impotence against his sternum.

Heaven was content to ignore him, their spectacular failure of an angel. He had run across their representative on Earth almost fifteen hundred years after his abrupt dismissal. Flosiel told him outright he personally thought Aziraphale should’ve had his wings ripped out at the root, but there was nothing he could do without contravening the punishment already passed down by God. Such an unpleasant fellow. No wonder Crowley worried after him.

Still, Aziraphale doubted Heaven would come to his door demanding the surrender of Crowley and Adam. In a fit of misdirected hopeful guilelessness, Aziraphale had drawn up a circle once and attempted to reach out to God. He’d never been prepared to repudiate his actions, but he thought—with all the talk of the New Testament and God’s subsequent mellowed approach to offense—he might at least argue his case to an open ear. The result had been rather reminiscent of the screech of an engaged fax line, though such a thing wouldn’t be invented for several more centuries, and an ensuing abrupt silence. It had taken Aziraphale almost an hour to realize he’d been struck deaf, and over a week for his hearing to return.

So, no. He doubted Heaven would come to him.

But there was still Hell.

And there were certainly some precautions one could take against Hell.

* * *

Adam didn’t sleep well. Crowley barely slept at all, and fitfully when he did. Both of them were understandably cranky when they rose the next morning, exacerbated by the sheer amount of shit which had managed to explode out of Adam’s diaper and all the way up his back to his neck. It had managed to leak through Adam’s pajamas, and Crowley was disgusted to discover his scales had been stewing in it overnight.

“Revolting,” he hissed.

Adam blinked at him and offered up his own enraged shriek of agreement.

He shifted back to his human form and stalked down the hall to the bathroom. There was no shower, because G—Sat—_Someone_ forbid such a modern convenience be shoved in where the antique clawfoot tub took up most of the space. Crowley ran a quick bath to scrub the worst off Adam, who twisted at the exact wrong moment while Crowley stripped him down and ended up with vaguely-popcorn-scented shit in his hair. Once clean, he screamed out his irritation when Crowley gently set him on the floor to see to himself. It wasn’t the towel; the towel, formerly threadbare terrycloth which should’ve been put to work as a dishrag instead of attempting the honour of drying off guests to the home, helpfully remembered it was supposed to be Turkish cotton and thick enough to prevent Adam from feeling the floor beneath it. No, no. It was vestiges of whatever minor irritation had him in such a state the night before. Crowley barely managed to scrub the scent of poo from his back before he was up and out of the far-too-chilly bathwater and scooping Adam up to get him dressed for the day.

Needless to say, he was in something of a strop when he finally made his way down to the kitchen, and even the sight of the bowl of coffee on the table did little to alleviate the annoyance.

He slunk down into his chair, sneering at the table until a warm bottle appeared before him.

“A rough night, then,” Aziraphale murmured.

“‘A rough night, then,’” Crowley mimicked caustically. He grabbed the bottle and stuck it in Adam’s mouth. The infant glared at him, but noisily began sucking the formula down. He shifted Adam around to brace the bottle with his chin and reached for his coffee, confident he could find some way to sip it out the side of his mouth without spilling any.

“Honestly,” Aziraphale sighed. He sat down next to Crowley and held out his arms.

Well. The Fallen angel had proven at least marginally competent until now. Crowley transferred Adam into his arms to give his coffee the appropriate devotion it deserved.

He was two-thirds of the way through the bowl when he noticed the tartan thermos sitting on the other side of the table. “What’s that, then?”

Aziraphale hummed under his breath. “I felt you needed some reassurance about your place here. A safety net, if you will.” He freed a couple of fingers from beneath Adam’s bottom and wiggled them in the thermos’ direction. “I can still bless water with the best of them.”

Crowley froze, bowl halfway to his mouth. “That’s holy water?” His hand ached at the thought of it. But, unlike his little hellions from the nineteenth century, Aziraphale would’ve made sure not to get any on the outside of the container. How a Fallen angel managed to retain the ability to bless anything was beyond him, but he hardly wanted to question this sudden luck.

“I thought having it might make you feel safer,” Aziraphale told him.

Crowley lowered the coffee to the table. He reached for the thermos—such a ridiculous pattern, where in the French countryside would they even sell something so insipidly English?—but hesitated before touching it. Aziraphale watched knowingly, gaze flitting between Crowley’s hand and his face.

Crowley sat back and pulled off his sunglasses, and looked at Aziraphale without them for the first time since the Garden. The Fallen angel was soft. Unbearably so. His hands were the only thing betraying the years of hard work he’d poured into the vineyard. And yet, despite all this softness, he’d armed Crowley with the tool he needed to protect them all from Hell. It took a moment to remember he’d been entrusted with a flaming sword, but Crowley resolved never to forget the fact again.

Aziraphale met Crowley’s eyes as he finished feeding Adam, and through the routine of settling and burping him.

“I need to go see to the presses,” he said. “If I leave the pulp in too long, it’ll spoil the rosé.”

Crowley accepted Adam back, the baby shockingly warm from his contact with Aziraphale.

“Do you…” Crowley paused. He glanced at the thermos once more. “Do you need help?”

Aziraphale lit up, unbearably bright. “Well. Yes. Yes, that would be lovely.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No significant warnings for this chapter! But Crowley continues to be a bit of a trainwreck.

An overcast, nippy autumn slowly shifted to a drizzly, cool winter. They never had much snow in this part of Alpes-Maritimes, but what they wanted for snow they certainly made up for in overcast days and rain. This year, especially, seemed to take special pride in the amount of rainfall. Crowley was more often in his company, trailing after him and allowing Aziraphale to prattle on about wine production from planting to consumption. They miracled up a playard to occupy Adam while they worked in the winery and shuttled cases into the cellar.

The fifteenth of November marked the two-month anniversary of Crowley and Adam coming to stay, and Aziraphale decided a small celebration was in order. Adam watched Aziraphale with rapt regard from his playmat on the floor as he bustled about the kitchen, raising and dropping his head and chest occasionally.

(“Tummy time,” Crowley said, “Terribly important.” Significant milestones were all helpfully recorded in one of the innumerable baby books that had been miraculously misdirected and delivered to the chateau, along with a number of other necessary baby items, and a laptop which was returned to sender once Crowley discovered that Aziraphale didn’t have access to the internet).

Most winters Aziraphale made due with a wide selection of flash-frozen meats and produce foraged from the market over the summer and into the autumn, but he’d decided that a celebration of this magnitude deserved something special. Marie had been happy to contribute some of her remarkable mille-feuille when Aziraphale had braved a bracing walk to the village to collect everything he needed.

Somewhere along the line, he’d picked up the habit of talking to Adam about his movements and actions. Likely because Crowley did the same, and it never failed to bring around a happy flush when Adam paid him such close attention.

“By submerging the duck in fat, it cooks up beautifully,” Aziraphale told him, turning to glance his way with a grin. “We’re going to let it sit in the oven for about three hours or so at the meagrest simmer. Then we’ll pull out some of those marvelous chestnuts I received from Claude and puree them up.”

Adam managed a small smile before flopping back down.

“Yes, exactly I…” He paused. “My dear boy, did you smile?” Aziraphale swept down and raised Adam into the air to buss his cheek. “Crowley, come quickly!”

There was a curse, the sound of a thud, and an ensuing thunder of steps as Crowley raced down from the bathroom above. 

Adam patted Aziraphale’s face.

“He's going to be thrilled,” he said. “What a clever child you are!” Adam had managed some small almost-smiles before, but nothing compared to the real thing, Aziraphale now knew.

Crowley tore into the kitchen, soaked from head to toe and with only a towel wrapped round his waist to preserve his modesty.

“What?!”

They blinked at each other. Aziraphale had rarely seen Crowley without his spectacles, though the demon's eyes always struck him as quite beautiful. But he definitely hadn’t had the opportunity to see him in such a state of undress. It was… illuminating. Crowley was all sharp lines and sinew, but outside of his usual severe fashion choices he appeared softer somehow, even with the defined musculature that likely would’ve been the envy of marathoners everywhere.

“Well?” Crowley demanded, wide eyes scanning the kitchen for whatever threat had persuaded Aziraphale to interrupt his bath.

“…Adam smiled,” Aziraphale forced out, well aware of how hoarse his voice sounded, even to his own ears.

Crowley let out a slow breath—remarkable, really, considering they didn’t strictly need to breathe—and crossed the space between them. Aziraphale did his utmost not to cringe; he couldn’t imagine being particularly pleased if someone had done him the discourtesy of interrupting him during a bath.

“He smiled?” Crowley repeated, a slow grin eating up ground across his face.

Relieved, Aziraphale nodded. He bounced Adam on his hip and kissed his cheek again.

“You smiled!”

Adam reached for Crowley. Crowley, given that he couldn’t deny Adam anything, reached back and subsequently dropped the towel. 

Funny how Aziraphale had never given the roof such close consideration before. There were cobwebs in the west corner that needed a good seeing to. Imminently more distracting than the knowledge that Crowley was making a (substantial) Effort.

“Do it again, little beast! Can you smile for da—” Crowley froze, smile sticking on his face despite the sudden swell of panic in his eyes.

“Crowley?”

“I…” Crowley pushed Adam back into Aziraphale’s arms and picked up his towel. “I’m going to go finish my bath.” He took off, not quite at a run.

Aziraphale frowned after him. “What on earth was that about?” he asked Adam. The baby seemed at as much of a loss as Aziraphale, and pouted mightily at where Crowley had disappeared out the door. Aziraphale pecked his cheek again and set him gently back down on his playmat. On his back, this time, to let him look up at the small safari of stuffed animals hanging from the overhead attachment. Adam reached for the zebra and was immediately distracted by his own hand.

Aziraphale flicked his fingers to clean up the puddles dotting the kitchen floor and returned to preparing their meal.

The bath seemed to last quite a long time. Throughout the entire cooktime for the confit, actually, and well into when they usually sat down together for supper. He had the last bottle of his 1951 mourvedre to pair, from the first year he’d been satisfied enough with the wine to start bottling it. It had the most exceptional smoky undertones, and would be brilliant with the blueberry-port sauce he’d whipped up to accompany the duck.

They waited for almost half an hour, though the food didn’t dare cool. Adam, propped up in Aziraphale’s lap and making a grab for everything on the table before them, seemed as much at a loss as Aziraphale.

“Shall we go see what he’s up to?” Aziraphale asked, using a minor miracle to make sure dinner would keep in his absence. 

Adam blew a spit bubble out through his lips.

Upstairs, the bathroom door was still closed.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale knocked. “Is everything well, my dear? Only, you’ve been in the bath for almost four hours.”

“Don’t come in!” Crowley replied.

Aziraphale and Adam regarded each other, equally unimpressed, and Aziraphale knocked again. “Do you need help?”

“No!”

“Then could you please tell me whatever it is that’s scared you into attempting to evolve aquatic traits?” He knew sea snakes existed, but this was frankly ridiculous.

“No!”

Aziraphale glanced at Adam with a raised eyebrow. “And here I thought I’d be waiting at least another two years before I began hearing that word ad nauseum.” Adam had no opinion on the matter. Yet. “Crowley, I’m coming in.”

At that, Crowley seemed to remember his somewhat more expansive vocabulary. “Fine, fine, just… give me a second, will you?”

It was at least another minute and a half before the door slowly creaked open and Crowley looked out at the two of them.

“Dinner is ready,” Aziraphale told him. “If you’d care to join us.”

“Nah. Not tonight. Sorry. Lots of… bathing. To do. Very dirty, me. Need a long soak. You understand.”

“I can assure you, I do not,” Aziraphale replied. “Is this about Adam smiling? I’m sorry you weren’t there, but I did call you as soon as it happened so you could share in the moment.”

“That’s not it,” Crowley said. “I almost called myself his…” He took a bracing breath. “Dad.”

“Yes? And?” Crowley gawked at him. “Crowley, this cannot be news to you. You’ve been almost completely responsible for his care and welfare for his entire life. Of course you’re his father.”

The gawk became gawkier. It wasn’t attractive. Or, at least, Aziraphale refused to admit it was.

“Ngk.” Crowley closed the door again.

Aziraphale sighed and knocked again, somewhat firmer this time. Crowley did not respond. “I don’t know why this is coming as a surprise, dearest. Since it is, I do hope you aren’t finding it to be an unpleasant one. Adam and I will be downstairs having supper.” He pressed his hand against the door. “We both want you there.”

Crowley did not emerge for dinner. Aziraphale ate at the table, the absence of the demon who should have been there a guest in and of itself, and a cranky baby who was obviously missing his father.

He also failed to join them for Adam’s bedtime. This was not the end of the world. Aziraphale was quite an adept hand at putting Adam to bed these days, and did so at least twice a week to give Crowley some much-needed reprieve. But with the bathtub inaccessible, it put the usual routine in terrible disarray. Adam was fussy through all three of Aziraphale’s attempted readings of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, cried around the nipple of his bottle, and wouldn’t sleep until Aziraphale tried (and failed) to remember the words to his favourite bebop song, cobbling together something passable at the last possible moment.

Unfairly frazzled, Aziraphale emerged from Adam’s room to find the door to the bathroom ajar, and the demon nowhere to be seen.

He stormed downstairs and searched the entire chateau before he finally found Crowley standing outside, in the rain, in a bathrobe with a bottle of 2007 grenache in hand.

“That’s not aged enough yet,” Aziraphale said, failing to keep his irritation out of his voice.

“I gathered,” Crowley spat back. He drank straight from the bottle anyway. “It was closest to the stairs.”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale began.

Crowley held up a finger, and Aziraphale gamely fell silent. He waited through another quarter of the bottle—honestly, it would be so underdeveloped, all Crowley was going to get was tannin. If he was going to punish himself for whatever unknown sin he’d committed, he could at least do so without wasting the potential of perfectly good wine.

“I’m not supposed to be his father,” Crowley told the vineyard. Aziraphale’s brow creased. “I’m supposed to be his… guardian. I don’t know,” Crowley flapped a hand about. “Just raise him well enough that he won’t see the appeal in destroying the earth in eleven years. I never said anything about becoming his father.”

For such a clever serpent, Crowley was truly stupid on occasion. “It has been abundantly obvious to me, since the day you arrived at my door, that you love Adam. ‘Raising him well enough’ is the basic mandate of parenthood. I’m sorry if this isn’t what you expected, or want, from the experience, but there it is. And if you’re not prepared for it, then perhaps…” Aziraphale paused, the words sitting sour in his cheeks. “…perhaps you should find another family for him.”

“Absolutely not,” Crowley hissed, spinning on his heel and fixing Aziraphale with a scathing glower. “No one’s raising him but me.”

“Then accept the honours and trappings that go along. They’re yours already, you only have to accept them. And him.” Aziraphale moved forward, closing the distance between them. “Let him be your son, Crowley. He’ll find no better father.”

Crowley stared at him, anguished.

“I’m going inside. I’ll be in the library when you decide to stop being ridiculous.”

He turned on his heel and retreated. En route to the library, he collected another bottle of grenache—a properly aged 1991—and a single glass. He dropped into his chair beside the fireplace, which had lit itself in self-defense when it had sense Aziraphale’s approach, and poured himself a glass so full he could practically see the meniscus above the lip. Forgoing his usual appreciation, he downed half of it in a single swallow, and immediately regretted it. His ’91 deserved better. It had wonderful character, and would undoubtedly develop into one of the greatest vintages of all time if given the right encouragement and guardianship through its young life.

He took another, smaller sip.

Crowley never joined him. Eventually, having finished the bottle, Aziraphale slowly plodded upstairs to check on Adam. His feet had never been quite as heavy. 

At the top of the stairs, he paused when he heard soft humming issuing from Adam’s room. Relieved beyond words, he crept down the hallway to peer inside. Crowley stood alongside the bassinette, rocking Adam back and forth though the baby was asleep and Crowley had cautioned Aziraphale more than once about letting him fall asleep on his own and not holding him past those precious first eyelash flutters.

Aziraphale smiled to himself and turned to head back to his room.

“Aziraphale?” Crowley whispered, summoning his attention. Aziraphale paused, waiting as Crowley kissed Adam’s forehead and lowered him back into his bed. He followed behind Aziraphale, but stopped as they reached the threshold to his room.

“I do want them. The honours, or whatever it is you said. ‘m not sure if I’ll be any good, but I want them.” The words seemed a revelation for him, flitting about in the air between them like awestruck butterflies begging for attention.

“You’re doing perfectly well from what I can see, dear,” Aziraphale murmured.

“Not sure I would be doing anything half as well without you,” Crowley said, voice low. Aziraphale’s heart gave a treacherous lurch. “Sorry I missed dinner.”

Aziraphale conjured up a small smile. “We’ll have a redo sometime soon.”

He stepped into his room, called back by Crowley whispering his name once more. Pulse thudding hummingbird-quick in his ears, Aziraphale turned.

“That wine definitely needed more time in the bottle.”

“Goodnight, Crowley.”

* * *

Midwinter passed, and shortly into the new year, Aziraphale declared his intention to travel to Lyon for some annual wine conference, where he and other vintners from across the country would get together to drink and complain about wine-related ills.

“I’d love for you to join me,” he said, “Truly, Crowley. I know you’ve probably been bored here these past few months.”

Bored wasn’t the word for it. Bored indicated certain negative connotations Crowley had never associated with the chateau. He couldn’t think of a way to express that without sounding egregiously soppy, however, and instead settled for a shrug and a, ‘yeah, could be fun.’

That, however, was before he’d seen the thing into which Aziraphale intended to stuff them.

“That’s not a car,” Crowley told him severely, staring at the… _vehicle_ in Aziraphale’s garage. It’d been tucked in behind the Bentley, covered by an expansive tarp to protect it from the elements, dust and—presumably—Crowley. “That’s a gondola cabin on wheels.”

“How charming,” Aziraphale enthused.

“Not charming,” Crowley argued. “Does it go more than twenty?”

“I'm sure I wouldn’t know.” Aziraphale gestured for him to round the car. “Come along. We can fit Adam’s car seat in between us, I should think.”

“I,” Crowley growled, “Am not driving in a BMW Isetta.”

If the car had any decency, it would’ve keeled over and died and allowed Aziraphale the dignity of driving something built after 1954. The little bubble car was now at the top of Crowley’s shit list, unseating Adam’s aggressively irritating yet beloved singing raccoon which had held the spot for the past three weeks. The fucking raccoon was going to unfortunately go permanently missing any day now.

“Why don’t we take mine,” Crowley suggested, still glaring at the Isetta. “Happy to drive. You can navigate us up to whatever poncy hotel your friends are staying at. We won’t even have to move Adam’s car seat, in that case.”

Aziraphale hummed noncommittally as he pondered it over. “Are you sure you don’t mind?”

“Oh, I insist.”

“Well thank you. I’ll go start fetching up our luggage.”

Aziraphale left the garage, which Crowley had thought to be completely uninhabited prior to his moving the Bentley in, and Crowley continued scowling at the Isetta. It was a ridiculous piece of dross. There wasn’t a trunk. The luggage rack was attached to the back. _The door opened at the front_. A wrench and a half hour would be all it took to break the thing down to component parts.

“You,” he hissed at it, “Are not good enough for him.”

The stupid little thing smugly continued to exist.

Adam’s car seat had to be adjusted to accommodate the nearly six-month child. He flapped his hands about, making it next to impossible for Crowley to get him settled, and screamed nonsense in Crowley’s ear when Crowley finally managed to get the straps on over his shoulders. Crowley kissed his forehead and offered him his dinosaur-shaped teether. The first of his little chompers was trying its best to poke through, which had made Adam severely disagreeable, to put it mildly.

Adam babbled at him, stuffing the dinosaur into his mouth and pulling it out again a half dozen times in quick succession before he snarled at it and stuffed the head straight into his gob.

“Well done, you. Show it who’s boss.”

Aziraphale returned with wine—“only the first case of five, dear”—instead of their luggage.

“I thought you didn’t sell any of it?” Crowley said, taking it from him to fit in the back of the Bentley.

“Oh, these aren’t for sale. They’re gifts for the other vintners.” Aziraphale frowned. “Though I might not let Achille have a bottle this year. Someone told me he sold the last one at auction, and I haven’t quite forgiven him yet.”

“Doesn’t deserve it anyway if he’s not going to enjoy it,” Crowley said. He peered at the box. “Is that the ‘88?” He’d liked the ’88. Good spice. Very structured. A bit like having a peppery berry compote.

“Hmm? Oh, yes. I think it’s finally ready, though it can probably stand a couple of more years in the bottle if they don’t want to drink it right away.”

Eventually, their luggage made it out and they managed to get on the road. Aziraphale clung to the door with a white-knuckled grip as Crowley sped through the backroads towards the highway, occasionally letting out small ‘meeps’ of panic.

It felt brilliant to be back on the road. Especially once he got onto the A51 past Volonne and could really open it up. Adam was nattering to himself from the backseat, but Aziraphale didn’t seem to share his enthusiasm.

“Dearest,” Aziraphale ventured after Crowley passed a small Volvo, shoving up the bowfinger at the other driver when he had to veer into oncoming traffic to get around the stupid bastard. “How long do you expect it to take to get to Lyon?”

“Took me about two hours last time.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale squeaked. “I don’t suppose you’d care to prolong the trip this time? Only, there’s so much lovely countryside…”

Crowley swerved almost off the road to squeak around a transport truck.

“It’s about the destination,” Crowley told him. “Not the journey.”

Adam screamed happily from the back.

They arrived in Lyon well ahead of schedule, and Aziraphale shakily climbed out to check them into their hotel. He had an agenda for the visit, which seemed to Crowley to most revolve around food, but they’d made it in passably good time and had a couple of hours to kill before the evening’s reception.

“Shall we go pick up a few odds and ends?” Aziraphale asked, popping back to the car with room keys. He directed Crowley to where they could park. “I’m sure Adam is close to outgrowing his wardrobe again.”

“Need to stop feeding you, don’t we little beast?” Crowley asked the rearview mirror. He’d attached another mirror to the backseat to give him a good look at Adam when they drove. Adam grinned at it blithely.

They trailed along Rue du Président Édouard Herriot, mostly window shopping. Eventually they turned into a side street to stop at an elegant brasserie, where they graciously accommodated both the pushchair and Adam without blinking, conjuring up a perfectly-sized high chair without comment. At Crowley’s request, they provided a small glass of warm water for him to mix up some pablum, and spooned a bit into Adam’s mouth as Aziraphale ordered enough food for them to share. A tidy stack of beef tartare topped by a delicate fried egg, layers upon layers of smoked salmon and goat’s cheese, caviar which Crowley was ordered to try along with a glass of sparkling white wine, and a truly decadent assortment of cheeses. All this paired with a wine flight that, while excellent, didn’t compare to Aziraphale’s offerings.

They ambled out once finished, Crowley opting to carry Adam in his arms while Aziraphale pushed the pushchair. Eventually, they located a children’s store, and Crowley had to use every ounce of his power of persuasion to prevent Aziraphale from buying Adam a tiny waistcoat and matching blazer.

“I’ve always liked this style of fashion,” Aziraphale admitted. “Wasn’t ever practical, though. I can’t imagine how awfully dirty it would’ve gotten from my work in the vineyard.”

“Why not just miracle it clean?”

Aziraphale pouted. “It’s not the same. You can always tell.”

With a roll of his eyes, Crowley gamely added the waistcoat to the pile.

The lamentable sartorial choices were nothing compared to when Aziraphale stumbled across the books. They had a generous collection already, but Someone forbid Aziraphale not starting Adam out with his own little library.

“You have to admit this one is charming!” Aziraphale said as they left the shoppe, a very pleased commissioned salesperson basking in the wake of their departure. “You record a message for your child that plays when the book opens. It’s lovely.”

“As long as we agree on what’s being recorded,” Crowley said, eyeing the cover. There was something about a monkey. He doubted Aziraphale had even flipped through it before deciding that they absolutely had to have it.

“Of course,” Aziraphale said. Butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. Crowley shook his head, a small smile curling up the corner of his mouth.

Almost back at the hotel, Aziraphale’s nose wrinkled. “Oh dear. Seems there may be a sewer backup nearby. I hope it doesn’t interfere with the reception tonight.”

Crowley shifted Adam to his other hip. “’m sure it’ll be fine.” He looked between Aziraphale and Adam. “Mind taking him? I’m going to go stick all this shit in the car.”

“Have some respect for your son’s possessions, Crowley. He’ll model his behaviour after you.”

Crowley rolled his eyes fondly and took off towards the hotel’s private car park, leaving Aziraphale with Adam and the book; the Fallen angel was probably already planning to record some sentimental codswallop once Crowley was out of range.

The smell followed him, growing stronger as he turned down a narrow alleyway. Sewage, sulphur, a kiss of rot. Imminently and predictably familiar. It was a miracle they hadn’t been traced to the vineyard—whether demonic or angelic, who could say?—but the miracle seemed to run out now they were in Lyon.

“Crawly.”

Crowley dropped his bags and spun. Hastur. Of all the demons in all the circles of Hell, it had to be Hastur.

“Duke,” Crowley responded. “You’re looking well.”

“Where’s the child?” Hastur demanded.

Oh, good. He hadn’t seen Adam with Aziraphale. Probably too distracted by his own navel.

“Child?” There wasn’t much he’d be able to do. He had no weapons—not that he’d ever really been much of a fighter, really preferred the whole ‘live to fight another day’ thing—and his angel was off reading to his son. And if he did manage to discorporate Hastur, he’d toddle back down to Hell and tell the entire bunch of them where Crowley could be found. They’d scour the French countryside, and eventually find the vineyard. Crowley couldn’t have that. It’d have to be a permanent death or nothing, and considering his thermos of holy water was back in the chateau, he had precious few options.

“The Antichrist. The Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan and Lord of Darkness,” Hastur clarified helpfully. “We know you took him. Wasn’t never properly delivered, was he? We investigated the American diplomat and his family. The child was not of our Lord Satan’s get.”

Fuck.

“Well. Maybe you should talk to the nuns?” It’d been a messy bit of chicanery, actually. The equivalent of pointing and shouting ‘what’s that?!’ and then taking advantage of the distraction. Had the nuns in question been halfway clever, he’d never have gotten away with it.

“I killed those nuns.”

“Then I suppose you’re buggered. I certainly don’t have him.”

“You know where he is,” Hastur growled. Foamy spit dripped mad-dog from his lips. “You were seen with him by the agents of Heaven.”

“What, and you’re going to believe a bunch of sanctimonious—”

“Yes,” Hastur said, flat. “And I’m going to make you tell me where he’s got to.”

No going back, then. Crowley could probably make it to the Bentley. Take off. He trusted Aziraphale with Adam; he could lead Hell well away from them both. Hopefully make plans to return in a few years, once they’d lost his trail. If they lost his trail. If Crowley made it any further than the end of the street before Hastur miracled his way into the Bentley’s backseat and horribly discorporated him and he spent the next eleven years being horrifically tortured in Hell.

Still better than letting them get to Adam and Aziraphale.

He darted left, hoping to reach the carpark entrance before Hastur caught him. He flung himself up the shallow stairs to haul the door open, only to find Ligur lurking on the other side. Champion lurker, Ligur; Crowley should’ve remembered. Ligur threw out his hands and shoved, and Crowley toppled back down the stairs, hitting the pavement hard.

“He’s not in the bastard’s car,” Ligur confirmed.

“You don’t leave a baby unattended in a car,” Crowley wheezed, mind racing as he considered his options. Most times he’d tangled with Flosiel, he’d gotten away with tricks and traps to get the angel out of the way. No chance of that here and now. “But good on you both for checking. I’d say you’ve passed the competency evaluation.”

“What.”

“Deigned by the Dark Lord himself. Wanted to make sure you two were up to snuff, being so rarely on Earth and all. Found me, asked the right questions, checked the right places… all together, I’d say well done. I’ll let him know you’re both exceedingly adequate.”

“Adequate,” Ligur repeated, affronted.

“Exceedingly so,” Crowley nodded, slowly rising to his feet. “Now, if you’ll just let me pop up, I’ll go write up the report and send it along.”

“He’s a liar,” Hastur snarled.

“Generally, yes,” Crowley agreed. “Isn’t that the point?”

They both pondered this for a moment, and Crowley wondered if they were truly thick enough to let him get away with this.

“Let’s kill him,” Hastur finally decided.

“Yeah. Get some real answers if we’ve got him back Downstairs.”

“I don’t think so, gentlemen.”

Double fuck.

The three demons all spun to face the end of the alley, where Aziraphale was standing with Adam braced on his hip and the goddamn monkey book in his hands.

“That’s my demon,” Aziraphale stated. It would’ve been touching, really, had Crowley not been in the grips of the worst panic he’d ever felt in his excessively long time on Earth.

“Is that him?” Hastur demanded, zeroing in on Adam.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley gasped. He took a staggering step forward, only for Ligur to snatch the back of his scarf and haul him backwards. He hit the ground at Ligur’s feet.

“Do you two like children’s books? No? This one is just fascinating. Here, let me show you.”

He opened the book. A tinnyish recording of his voice began speaking Latin, and Crowley frowned as a strange feeling of displacement began sucking at his chest. Not unlike being swept overboard during a storm at sea; deeply unpleasant and nothing he ever wanted to experience again.

The next thing he knew, he was staring at the monkey.

“What the fuck,” he said. He glanced at his hand, eyes widening when he realized he seemed to now me made of paint. They’d gotten his shading all wrong, too.

The monkey looked equally confused. And then had a severe attack of the wobblies when Hastur and Ligur appeared beside him.

“Was that the Ritual of Brogia?” Hastur demanded of the monkey, apparently intent on ignoring Crowley until he had answers.

The monkey took off into the watercolour jungle, followed by two irate demons.

Crowley spent a moment pondering his nascent existential crisis—he was a painting in a children's book which didn't seem to have an apple tree anywhere—when he heard someone calling his voice. The next thing he knew he was back in the alley in Lyon, slightly shaken, but no longer illustrated. Aziraphale, standing nearby, was still holding the book in his hands, though he snapped it shut one-handed once Crowley whipped around to look at him.

“We’ll need to buy a second copy,” the Fallen angel said. “I shudder to think what those two are doing to the poor monkey.”

“What, and I cannot stress this enough, the fuck.”

“Language, Crowley,” Aziraphale said, bouncing Adam in his arms.

“Area of least concern right now.”

"I simply recorded the Ritual of Brogia to impel them inside the book." At Crowley's baffled expression, Aziraphale huffed out a sigh. “Crowley, I have been on my own on this Earth for nearly six thousand years. These are not the first demons I’ve encountered during that time. An outcast learns to protect himself.”

“How many other demons have you got trapped in children’s storybooks, then?!”

“None, but I did leave one buried in a wine bottle somewhere near Toulouse.” Aziraphale passed Adam to Crowley and picked up the abandoned packages. “Come along. We still have time to get changed before the reception. I think Adam will look quite dapper in his new suit, don’t you?”

“This conversation isn’t over!”

“Whatever you say, dear.”

* * *

Crowley bowed out of the reception shortly before Adam’s bedtime, leaving Aziraphale to get drunk with his oenophile friends and complain about Éric de Rothschild. Adam splashed about in the clawfoot tub, allowed Crowley to read him two of his new books, and took his bottle without complaint before passing into an easy sleep.

“Exciting day, hmm, little beast?”

With Hastur and Ligur terrorizing a watercolour monkey until Aziraphale chose to release them, Hell likely wouldn’t send any more agents, Crowley thought. Not only because they’d be focused on OG Doomsday Prepping, but because they’d trust Hastur to take care of business. Sending up anymore agents without an express request would generally result in Hastur taking lethal exception to it, and Hastur was one demon no one wanted to cross.

Aziraphale arrived upstairs around midnight, thoroughly pickled and grinning ear-to-ear.

“You needn’t have waited up,” he protested.

“Wanted to,” Crowley shrugged. “Not like I really need the sleep anyway.”

“But you _enjoy_ it,” Aziraphale protested. He glanced at the playard the hotel had helpfully provided and shushed himself with a finger on his lips. “Get some sleep, my dear. Tomorrow is the grand tasting event.”

“Right. Might take Adam on a walk, instead. Let you get bladdered with your friends.”

“Mmm,” Aziraphale collapsed into one of the exceedingly overstuffed armchairs near the enormous bay window overlooking the Rhône. “It’s better now you’re here.”

Aziraphale tripped over into a light doze—not sleep, he’d insist, if he could hear the tenor of Crowley’s thoughts—leaving Crowley to study him in silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's left comments and kudos thusfar - it means the world to me!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The only warning I have for this chapter is excessive fangirling over wine, for which I remain unapologetic.

Adam began crawling precisely on schedule, leading to a somewhat desperate attempt to childproof a home that had never seen such a young a child in it before. A number of miracles were used as Crowley trailed after him, watching with no small wonder of his own as Adam explored the chateau. Aziraphale, the much more indulgent of them to the surprise of absolutely no one, allowed Adam to pull himself up on his trousers and bent over for hours at a time, holding Adam’s hands to allow him to take uncoordinated steps for miles about the place. He never complained over it, instead insisting that he was a much preferable alternative to “that horrible walking contraption, Crowley, honestly he’s going to take a header down the stairs any day now.”

Come March, Aziraphale’s focus returned to the vineyard, and Crowley listened to Aziraphale talk about aging and oak, and gamely played devil’s advocate as best he could as Aziraphale tried to consider what he was to do with the unused half-acre of land in his easternmost corner.

“I pulled up my chenin blanc grapes a few years ago, and I think the ground has recovered enough to support new vines,” he mused over dinner, late one evening.

“Often rotate out your grapes, then, do you?” Crowley asked, sniffing at a glass of Aziraphale’s 1962 mourvedre—a year Aziraphale admitted to not being terribly impressed with, though it paired well with their meal. An open bottle sat between plates of fatty ribeye steaks prepared au poivre, the rich red more than half gone though dinner had barely begun.

In his high chair, Adam looked increasingly displeased with his pureed beef, which Aziraphale absent-mindedly scooped into his mouth while looking over a map of his vineyard. Adam spat it out, and Aziraphale easily caught it in the small plastic spoon to return it to Adam’s mouth. The move to proper solid foods from pablum had been… instructive. Textured solids were a recent introduction, and the subsequent diapers had, according to Crowley, been unspeakably vile, even compared to Hell. Aziraphale was determined to start the boy off on the right foot, gastronomically, and had begun flipping through one of Crowley’s countless parenting books to determine when he could start mixing in any modicum of seasoning.

“It depends,” Aziraphale replied. “My grenache vines have been planted for almost three hundred years. But I spent most of the last century investing heavily in my cinsault, and I’m afraid I’ve let the rest of my reds and whites go wild. I’m not thrilled with my viognier from last year. It might be time to pull the vines and replant.”

Something about his face made Crowley laugh, and the demon refilled their glasses.

Occasionally, Crowley deigned to join him in his trundles down to the village, reluctantly allowing Aziraphale to coerce him into interacting with the neighbours. Marie, especially, cooed over Adam and rounded the counter with open arms to take him. Crowley tensed, but allowed it when Aziraphale touched his elbow.

“It is good for you to have someone,” she told him in a half-whisper, either deciding Crowley wouldn’t overhear or uncaring if he did. “And his son is adorable.”

“Thank you,” Aziraphale said through a deep and unsettling blush. Crowley ignored them, spending his time perusing the pastries on display. “Adam is a darling.”

“Oh, yes. Adam is the darling.” She offered a salacious wink, handed Adam back, and boxed up an assortment of goodies for them to take back home.

Over a spot of lunch at the village’s only café, Crowley offered a slightly raised eyebrow.

“Breaking hearts all over Provence, are we?” he commented.

“Who? Marie? Oh, no. I’ve known her since she was born.” He had, in fact, known almost every person in the village since they’d been born, save a few transplants who had snuck in over the years. A few simple miracles here and there managed to maintain his illusion of being the most recent descendent of the vineyard’s founder, regardless no one had ever met a progenitor of any persuasion.

“No human can catch your eye, then?”

“I may have had my dalliances in the past,” Aziraphale responded, primly. Best not mention Oscar, when he knew Crowley had seen the sad room he kept _in memoriam_. “But certainly no one from the village. It would be out of the question.” It was hard enough, seeing the people he knew aging and passing from the world. Imagine taking a lover from among them? When human lives already felt tragically short?

“Hmm.” Crowley pushed a spoonful of peas into Adam’s mouth, much to the child’s obvious disgust. Peas were the latest in a succession of pureed vegetables that, while differing in colour, all managed to somehow taste exactly the same.

In late March, Aziraphale brokered a deal with another winery in the neighbourhood to trade some cuttings of his grenache vines—the older, more reliable ones which made up most of the body of his rosés—for a few cuttings of bourboulenc, which he hoped would fix some of the issues he was having with his viognier. If not, well… Crowley touted fascinating philosophies about dealing with recalcitrant plants.

As spring unfurled around them—days lengthening, the return of his glorious pollinators, infant grapes on the vines—Crowley grew increasingly restless.

“You’re making me nervous, my dear,” Aziraphale said one morning, trying to navigate a small plastic spoon through Adam’s remarkable evasion tactics to get a mouthful of oatmeal into him.

“Just thinking about Hastur and Ligur,” Crowley said.

The poor monkey. The now highly inappropriate children’s book was tucked up away in Aziraphale’s attic, inside a box of mothballs that barely managed to contain the scent of it. Crowley had suggested burying it somewhere on the property, but Aziraphale couldn’t help but think it would have some impact on the quality of his grapes.

Crowley continued, “I think it might be safe for me to return to London.” Whenever he spoke of his home there, he flexed his scarred hand, though Aziraphale doubted he even noticed himself doing it. “There are things I should check on.”

“Well,” Aziraphale said quietly, “If you have to.” He tried not to let his shoulders slump. If Crowley and Adam left, he couldn’t shake the feeling they’d never return. Crowley seemed happy, here, but one could never be sure. It made his heart ache to consider, but if Crowley was determined to go…

“Hell’s going to be satisfied with thinking that Hastur is still looking for us. But I’m not sure about Heaven,” Crowley said, slowly, as though mentioning Heaven would somehow offend. He shifted his gaze around the kitchen, apparently determined to look anywhere save directly Aziraphale’s way. “I thought, if it’s not too much trouble, I might leave Adam here? It would only be for a few nights, and I know it’s an imposition…”

A smile burst across Aziraphale’s face, wide enough to make his cheeks ache. “Of course, my dear. Adam and I will have a fine time together.” He finally managed to slip the spoon past Adam’s lips. Surprised at his failure to deflect the enemy, Adam smacked his lips around the oatmeal, startled at its presence in his mouth.

Crowley dithered in his departure, pushing it off for “tomorrow, I think Adam has a cold/the Bentley needs to stretch her axels before we go for any long trips/I don’t like the look of those clouds,” until he ran out of excuses to delay any longer.

Crowley held Adam tight in his arms, the baby squirming about and trying to crane a look at Aziraphale over his shoulder.

“I think you’re making him nervous,” Aziraphale pointed out gently.

Crowley coughed and passed Adam back. Then, drawing a pair of sunglasses from his front breast pocket, he turned his attention Aziraphale’s way.

“I have my mobile.”

“Yes, you’ve it mentioned once or twice.” Closer to a dozen times since joining him for breakfast, all the while maligning Aziraphale’s comparably simple rotary number in the tasting room. “We’ll be fine.”

Crowley looked as though he had more to say. Instead, he reached out and placed a hand against Aziraphale’s cheek. Aziraphale shivered at the touch, but his gaze remained locked on Crowley’s. It was next to impossible to tell anything about him with those cursed shades covering his eyes, but there was the smallest downturn to the corner of his mouth which Aziraphale thought might say it all.

“Won’t be more than a few nights,” Crowley promised. “But if… if they’re waiting for me, and I can’t come home…”

_Home_. “You will,” Aziraphale ordered him, heart fluttering at the casual use of the word. “You will come home to us, Crowley.”

Crowley nodded and dropped his hand. Then, without another word, he hopped in his Bentley and sped away.

Adam watched after him, confused. “Ba?”

“Indeed, my boy.” He swung Adam around and brought him to rest on his hip. “Let’s see what we can manage together.”

‘Manage’ was a loose word for it. Adam, while generally good-natured, was conversely a wiggling terror determined to figure out the mechanics of walking at least full month ahead of schedule. Aziraphale would put him down in a bed of soft clover, only to turn around and find him underneath one of the vines, peering up at the grapes with great concentration for one who couldn’t clearly see much of anything. If he was sitting in his saucer, he’d bounce until it moved across the tile, bringing him perilously close to such hazards as the terrace door and the stove. He had a clear fascination with flowers, and more than once grabbed for them with such vehemence Aziraphale had to catch him before he dashed himself against the floor.

“I think we’ll need to find something more effective,” Aziraphale commented as Adam enjoyed his last bottle before bedtime.

The next morning, Aziraphale brought the Isetta out of the barn and, after a short struggle with Adam’s car seat requiring more than one miracle—as well as a number of unsavoury words muttered under his breath—they took off towards Nice. Despite having not used the lovely old machine in almost a year, he wasn’t afraid of running out of petrol—truth be told, there had never been more than about a quarter tank of gas in the car in the entire period of its existence, and yet it managed the occasional trip down to the coast without any real problem, much to the satisfaction of both car and driver—and they puttered along slowly, Aziraphale narrating the countryside as they passed, remembering when towns had sprung up from nowhere over the course of only a single century.

Aziraphale made a point of visiting Nice once or twice a year, generally before spring and after the harvest. He’d been rather occupied with his housemates before winter had descended, and thus had a lengthier than usual list of items he needed to collect.

First and foremost was a ‘Babybjörn.’ He’d had limited research on it, but Marie had insisted it was imperative for busy parents, and considering her experience encompassed a family of seven younger siblings, he was inclined to take her word as authority.

The contraption was intimidating, at first; all black straps and mystifying buckles. Fortunately, the lady at the checkout was terribly helpful.

"Your son is beautiful," she said.

"Thank you." Aziraphale leaned over the pushchair and ran a gentle hand across Adam's head.

"May I also recommend this? It's a new product, just brought in from America. They call it a 'peepee teepee.'" The English was awkward but serviceable. "You put it in place while you're changing him. It prevents... unfortunate spray."

"How clever," Aziraphale beamed. "By all means."

Once they had settled up, she helped him with the harness, and before long he was strolling down Cours Sayela, towards his favourite perfumery, with Adam strapped to his chest and gleefully examining the world around them.

Aziraphale had been using the same cologne for almost fifty years, but as he and Adam looked around the showroom, he found himself struck by a flight of whimsy. The young lady assisting him cooed over Adam, and brightened when Aziraphale mentioned his desire to try something new.

“Let me show you what we have,” she said, eyes alight. “You are currently wearing something with a bergamot base, yes?” 

“Yes, the Valentin.” He infrequently wore cologne—interfered too much with the nose of the wines—but it was nice to treat himself occasionally.

“Let me recommend a few others. Still a bergamot base? Or do you want to go further afield?”

“I place myself in your capable hands.”

At some point, one of the other sales associates offered their hands out for Adam, and Aziraphale slipped him out of the harness to give him a chance to stretch out. They allowed him to scent a dozen different colognes before he landed on a new favourite.

"It has an under-scent of apples, complementing the top notes of citrus, tonka bean and agarwood. A hint of beeswax to make it more masculine."

"Lovely," Aziraphale breathed. He bought enough to last him through the summer, and remembered to collect Adam before making his way to his usual restaurant.

Despite the fact the host insisted they could not accommodate a child of Adam's age, within seconds of Aziraphale being seated, a bewildered waiter returned with a high chair he insisted had not been next to the bathrooms last time he'd checked. Or ever. Fortunately for all of them, Adam fit perfectly.

“For myself, the sautéed kidneys with wild mushroom risotto, with the Didier Dagueneau. And the young gentlemen will have steamed carrots and a bit of pureed chicken, please.”

The kidneys were sublime when paired with the intensely crisp white, and Aziraphale deigned share a small bit of his risotto with Adam, who immediately preferred it to his own humble offerings. He splattered most of it down his bib, and proceeded to glower in a endearingly familiar manner as Aziraphale was served dessert.

"Don't look at me like that," Aziraphale scolded as Adam regarded the Crêpes Suzette with intense longing. "Do you know what your father would do to me if I let you have any of this?"

"Ba," Adam argued, smacking his spoon against the antique wood highchair and then widening his eyes, tears but moments away.

"Well. I suppose you raise a valid point." Aziraphale wasn't made of stone. "All right, but not a word." He dipped his spoon in the sauce and dotted Adam's lip with a single touch.

"Ba!"

"Yes. It is delicious." Aziraphale had another bite, and placed another small bead of sauce on Adam's lips. "After lunch, shall we head to the beach?"

It was early in the season, and only a few stalwart tourists and hopeful sunbathers lined the shore. Aziraphale stripped Adam of his carrot-stained shirt and pants, and used a small miracle to ensure his modesty with what Crowley would probably argue to be an ancient swimming costume, terribly inappropriate for the modern day. Tosh, of course. Aziraphale had worn one almost identical in 1865. With a small touch to Adam's hat--the green turtles simply did not match the navy swimsuit, and they were happy to change into cerulean whales--they were ready to discover the sea. Aziraphale held Adam's hands, assisting him to totter down to the water. As soon as Adam's toes poked into the sea, he began babbling nonsense at full speed, and pulled his hands away from Aziraphale to sit down, hard, in the sand.

"A bit cool," Aziraphale said. Taking the pointed criticism to heart, the surf increased by several degrees. "But isn't this nice?"

Adam stuffed a handful of sand into his mouth in agreement.

He was fast asleep in his car seat when they pulled back up to the chateau. The Bentley was not parked in its customary spot out front, disappointing but not surprising. Aziraphale eased Adam out of his car seat, and carried him upstairs to bed.

(If such things were to be noted, the 'peepee teepees' were thrown into the rubbish bin the following morning when, during the replacing of a extraordinarily heavy diaper, one was launched a full two feet off the change table by the very enemy it was supposed to combat).

* * *

Aziraphale wasn’t meticulous about caring for his wings, but he did make sure to give them an occasional once-over. It kept his hands busy, anyway, and he often took the adage about idle hands to heart. Adam was pleasant company, even in Crowley’s absence: chatty without being pretentious, generous with his smiles, and such a wonderful laugh! He bounced in his saucer as Aziraphale groomed his wings, alternating between fascination over his singing raccoon and shifting his attention to Aziraphale’s feathers.

One of his older secondaries came loose, and floated to the floor. Adam zeroed in on it with the intensity he usually reserved for mashed pears and made grabby hands. “Ba!”

Aziraphale tucked his wings back away and scooped the feather up off the floor. Holding it up above Adam’s head, he let it go, allowing it to gently float down.

Adam burst into delighted peals of laughter, his entire body shaking with unbridled joy.

Aziraphale caught his own laugh a heartbeat before it left his lips, and picked up the feather again.

Adam was practically sobbing with laughter about five minutes later, when a knock on the door interrupted their game. Scooping Adam up into his arms, Aziraphale tucked the feather into the saucer’s seat and made his way to the door.

On the other side, two young women in their early twenties smiled broadly at him.

“_Bonjour_,” the taller of the two greeted. “_J'aime le vin. Uh ... tu parles anglais?_”

“Yes, my dear. Quite well. Please, won’t you both come in?” For all Crowley’s mockery about his British habits, the young women wouldn’t hear anything out of the ordinary. To them, he was merely another French vintner with heavily-accented, though imminently understandable, English.

“Thank you! I’m Heather, and this is my sister Jasmine. We’ve been visiting all the family-owned wineries in the area, and we were hoping you’d opened for the season?” She looked despairingly hopeful. And polite. Just the sort of people Aziraphale enjoyed inviting inside.

“By all means,” Aziraphale said. He moved to the side, opening the door to allow them in. “Do you know much about Château de l'Ange Abandonné?”

Heather pulled a small notebook out of her back pocket, an illustration of aubergine grapes decorating the cover. She flipped through a few pages before regarding him sheepishly. “Uh… no. Not really. We were passing through the village and the lady at the bakery told us we had to stop by.”

“Well, then. Let me tell you about us. Firstly, we are not a classified estate, despite the age of the vineyards…” There were too many expectations around following rules Aziraphale long decided were better suited for larger producers. He had nothing against the classifications, of course, but he did enjoy having the freedom to rip out his braquet vines when he’d turned his eyes towards rosé. He continued on absently, accustomed to the speech.

Adam patted his cheek, and Aziraphale looked down at him adoringly. “I’m sorry, darling, is this boring you?” He hoisted Adam into the air, enjoying the giggle he received in response. “Should we show them the cellar?”

“Would you?” Heather asked with an expansive, hopeful grin.

“By all means. Let me get him settled.” They followed after him into the kitchen, and Heather helpfully held Adam while Aziraphale strapped on the Babybjörn. Such a splendid thing—already proving its worth a hundred times over. “Our cellar,” he began, tightening the straps. Heather bounced Adam in place, though her sister looked more interested to in the kitchen itself. “Was dug out by hand—” Miracled out, really, but through no small effort, “from an existing cave system which runs over a mile north, under the vineyard. It’s been used to keep and preserve my wines for centuries.” He accepted Adam back, bussed his cheek and then settled him into the Babybjörn. “Many of our older bottles enjoy a passionate relationship with mold, and I’ll ask you not to disturb any of them.”

He was careful on the steep stairway with Adam cradled against his chest, using the wrought-iron railing he’d installed after one too many visitors had blanched at taking the roughed-in steps down. Heather and Jasmine trailed behind him, Jasmine pausing occasionally to look at the parts of the wall he’d carved out in the past, when he’d had to rely on lamplight and candles to find his way.

“Our oldest wines were preserved in clay jugs and copper amphorae, and would be considered completely undrinkable today.” Truthfully, it’d been mostly undrinkable back when he’d first started anyway. Figuring out the grapes, the aging, fermentation, storage… it had been quite the learning process. He probably hadn’t had a truly drinkable batch for the first century.

“Do you still have any of the original wine form the vineyard?”

“Unfortunately, no. But come along.” He led them down the winding passageway towards the back of the cellar. Thousands of bottles lined the walls, punctuated by the presence of large barrels. Without printed labels, he was meticulous about labeling the bottles with grease pencil with the varietals and the years in which they’d been produced. He’d never seen the need for printed labels, though Oscar had railed to him about it during one of his visits. “We’re a very small batch vineyard. I’d estimate we produce less than two hundred and fifty cases per year, none of which are available commercially.”

Aziraphale had long ago moved the bottle he was looking for closer to the entrance, partly for showmanship, and partly because it was his oldest companion. It was short, squat, and sealed with heavy amounts of wax. “This is our oldest wine, from 1670. The last one of the batch. The vineyard only produced reds at the time, with grapes very similar to a modern carignan.”

Adam reached for the bottle, and Aziraphale brought it closer to let him touch it. “Marvellous, isn’t it, darling?”

“This cellar is incredible,” Heather said. “The other wineries we visited never offered us a tour.”

“Because they wanted, like, fifty euros to let us take a look,” Jasmine grumbled.

“I sense you’re not an oenophile,” Aziraphale said. Jasmine shrugged. “What is your area of interest, then?”

“History,” Jasmine replied. “I mean, sorry, but I prefer beer.” She tilted her head at Heather. “She’s the wine snob.”

“Honesty is the best policy, in my experience.” He placed the bottle back, but retrieved one from the next shelf. “We’ll see if we can’t change your mind. At least a little. Anthony wasn’t much of a connoisseur before he joined me, either.”

“Anthony?” Heather repeated, politely.

“Yes. He’s in England, at the moment, and we miss him immensely, don’t we?” Adam shrieked, either whether in agreement or for his own merriment. “He inhaled anything cheap instead of taking the time to consider what was in his glass. But he’s come along, hasn’t he? I can’t think of what life would be like without him.”

He noticed Heather and Jasmine exchange small smiles, but continued nattering on at Adam about how much Crowley was missed instead of pursuing it.

On their way back, he paused next to one of the barrels. “This is for you, my dear. Since you enjoy history.” He twisted the spigot to the left, and the barrel cap swung open, revealing a squat passage inside leading to an open room beyond. Jasmine’s eyes boggled. “We used this during the war, when La Résistance was trying to push the foreign invaders out.” The barrel itself was bolted to the wall, to give it the appearance of being full, and too heavy to move. “There wasn’t much action this way, and it gave us the perfect opportunity to hide some of the fighters.

“Look. This is quite clever, if I do say so myself.” He pulled the door back towards them. “See the lip, here? The front of the barrel would be filled with up to ten bottles of wine which could actually be poured, in case there was any question about the barrel’s authenticity.”

“And your—I guess it would have been your grandfather?—hid resistance fighters in there?”

“The Axis soldiers enjoyed their wine as well,” Aziraphale said. “We mostly saw Italian soldiers out this way. They’d come by, and drink, and talk. This bolthole is located right under our tasting room, where the officers would congregate and drink. The more they had, the looser their lips. La Résistance was able to get a fantastic amount of information from merely sitting tight and listening.” They’d all struck Aziraphale as overwhelmingly tired, resistance fighters and invaders alike. Especially towards the end of the war.

“May I?” Jasmine asked.

“By all means. Mind the cobwebs, though.” A visitor in the ‘70s had suggested arranging the room as it had been during those last years of the War, and including the presence of mannequins. It had struck Aziraphale as horrifically morbid. There was no way Helyette and Jean-Michele would have wanted to be remembered in such a way.

Jasmine took her time examining the room, spending a few extra moments studying the copper pipework connecting it to the room above. It had been Helyette’s idea. She’d been such a wonderfully clever woman, and he’d mostly forgiven her for drinking his entire collection of 1920 grenache.

Tour concluded, he led them back up to the tasting room, nabbing a few bottles along the way.

“Now, usually I sample wines from the past fifty years, but as you’re my first visitors of the season…” He placed the bottles on the table and retrieved his ah-so to open the first bottle. He set the wine to breathe and ferried Adam to the playard set up in the corner. Adam clung to the side and bounced up and down a moment before falling back onto his bottom and grabbing up one his cloth hedgehog to gnaw on its head.

“I know, we miss your father, don’t we my darling?” He pecked Adam’s forehead. “Our home doesn’t feel the same without him.”

He noticed Heather and Jasmine’s scrutiny in time to cough and straighten, then returned his attention to the wine. “This was bottled in 1934.” He took a few moments to describe it as he transferred it, swirling it aggressively around in the glass decanter as he did.

“Are you worried about your older wines over-maturing?” Heather asked.

As though they’d dare. “Not at all.”

He poured them a flight of five. Two reds—one substantially younger—two rosés, and a white. As they murmured over the first one, by far one of his better years, Aziraphale bustled about collecting a generous plate of cheese, meat and crackers for them to enjoy. He had some particularly good aged chevre available which performed wonders in the mouth when paired properly.

“Do you mind if I blog about this?” Heather asked as she swirled about the last sip of her last glass of wine.

“I don’t have the wifey, unfortunately.”

Heather grinned. “I can do it at home, if you don’t mind. It sucks more people don’t know about this place.”

“I assure you, dear, the people who need to find me always do.” He smiled regardless. “But by all means. If you wish to ‘blog’ it, go ahead.”

Heather and Jasmine left with the starry-eyed appreciation he’d come to love from those who tasted his wine for the right reasons. Before they went, he pressed a bottle of the 1934 into Heather's hands, waved off her shocked request for a price point, and saw them safely back to the small rental car parked in the lane.

Adam looked distinctly unimpressed when he returned.

“I’m sorry, darling, are we late for lunch?” Aziraphale scooped him up and, with a wave, locked the gates to outsiders. “Would you enjoy a small bite of cheese?”

Crowley returned the following night shortly before seven. For all Aziraphale had been concerned about him running astray of Hell—or Heaven—he looked to be in good condition.

Adam was already in bed, sweet little lamb, and Aziraphale steered Crowley into the kitchen for a hastily-prepared meal.

“I have some of the rabbit terrine you liked,” Aziraphale said. “And I’ll heat up the last of the tomato tart. I think some rocket with balsamic vinegar and oil might do as a good side…”

Crowley froze, unnaturally still, in the doorway to the kitchen. “What is that?” he demanded.

“What dear?” Aziraphale asked, absently.

Crowley crossed the space between the door and Adam’s saucer in two long strides, and grabbed up the feather that had fallen into the seat. “Thissss?!” he demanded. “Who was here? Did you…” The words froze in his mouth, as though he couldn’t bring himself to say them. “Where’s Adam?”

“He’s upstairs.”

Crowley took off at a run, eating up the stairs four at a time as he charged upwards to Adam’s nursery. Aziraphale followed, bewildered, as Crowley threw open the door and stood, panting, in the archway.

“Whatever is the matter?” Aziraphale demanded.

Crowley scooped the sleeping boy out of his cot and held him tightly against his chest, falling to his knees as his shoulders slumped in relief.

It only lasted a moment.

Crowley rose, Adam still tucked against him, and fixed Aziraphale with a withering glare. “Whose is it?” Crowley demanded. He held the feather aloft, clenched tightly in his fingers. “Who did you let in here?”

“It’s mine, Crowley.”

Crowley turned incredulous eyes on the feather, gleaming almost silver in sheen in the faint glow of Adam’s nightlight. “Yours?” he repeated. “Impossible.”

“Why do you say that?” Aziraphale demanded.

“It’s… white,” Crowley stammered, flapping it about in the air between them. “White, Aziraphale. Fallen angels don’t have white wings, even when they're not technically demons!"

“I never Fell, Crowley,” Aziraphale said.

Crowley, very slowly, eased Adam back down into the cot. He’d slept through the entire exchange, and Aziraphale approached the crib to pull his fleece blanket up over his shoulders. How strange… his hands were shaking.

“You never Fell,” Crowley echoed. “But you’re…” He frowned, and finally loosed a helpless, “What?”

Aziraphale breathed out a shaky breath and clasped his hands in front of him. “I think it’s best I open a bottle of wine or two, if I’m going to tell this story.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos gratefully accepted and cherished. :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter include: Biblically-themed but non-graphic death of children, high probability of historical inaccuracies, sex(!), and Gabriel being Gabriel. 
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has commented and left kudos thusfar! We're almost to the end. :)

_Assyria, 500 years After Eden_

Aziraphale had received orders to travel to the small village east of the Tigre, but nothing since. The settlement was only about a hundred strong, a budding start to what might truly be something magical. They nurtured the earth, worshipped all the gifts it gave them, and as Aziraphale waited for his assignment, he found himself folded into their lives. They taught him how exactly to put his hands into the soil and coax up life, whispering prayers not to God, but to the Earth itself. It seemed a rather roundabout way to do it, but was not God in all things? He learned from them how to cultivate and grow, and when the spring faded towards fall, he reaped the fruits of his labour, his hands hardening with every day spent collecting the gifts the ground provided.

Afterwards, the adults would sit around a communal fire, sharing stories and songs. They kept the fermented juice of grapes in clay jars, and when they finally convinced Aziraphale to try it, it made his stomach warm and his thoughts light. It truly was a splendid invention. He fell in love with it instantly, the sweet acidic way it graced his tongue and flushed his cheeks.

“Asira,” they called to him, “Asira, tell us a story of the Garden.”

He had never hidden himself from them. His wings were tucked away into the ether, not to conceal them, but because they would otherwise interfere with the day to day. He spoke to them of the Garden—lush and ripe with life—and watched as they all nodded sagely when he dropped his voice and whispered about the serpent who had tempted Adam and Eve. Whether they agreed with God or the serpent, he could never tell, and honestly wasn’t sure if he wanted to find out.

_(There were parts of the story Aziraphale left out of the telling, as he topped up Crowley’s glass a half dozen times into the night. Such as one evening, when—seated alongside a young bachelor—he’d near jumped when a hand came to rest on his thigh. He turned his head, blinking owlishly when he saw one of the young bachelors looking back at him with dark, hooded eyes. _

_“Tell me a story of the Garden, Asira,” he commanded gently._

_Aziraphale found himself thinking of Crawly, of shielding the demon from the rain, and his mouth went dry. The young man leaned forward, his hand sliding further up Aziraphale’s leg. When their mouths met, Aziraphale gasped for air, unused to sharing breath with another. Thus permitted, the young man took the chance to explore Aziraphale’s mouth with his tongue, every crevice, until he was satisfied. Aziraphale made an Effort without even understanding what he was doing, until a clever hand slipped beneath the hem of his robes._

_After that evening, their eyes occasionally caught across the fields, and while they shared small smiles, the young man was wise enough to move on to other lovers. It hadn’t been his name Aziraphale had called out, after all.)_

Aziraphale often found himself working next to a young girl named Dawa, barely sixteen summers old and heavy with her first child. Her partner, Denha traveled to surrounding settlements, looking to trade the riches of their community, and he was often away. Aziraphale kept her from having to bend down, instead using Denha’s tools to pull all manner of vegetables from the ground and slipping them into a heavy bag they carried between them. Dawa had an ever-present smile, a sweet disposition, and vibrant with the thrill of bringing a child into the world.

“The baby will be strong as Denha,” she said confidently. Then she laughed. “Or clever as me.”

“Not both?”

“Not both. Both is too much responsibility for one child, don’t you agree?”

They took meals together, and Dawa shared her knowledge of the earth which had treated them well; lush and fertile thanks to the nearby river. More than one night, she fell asleep against his arm and he carried her back to her hut and tucked her safely into bed. She murmured Denha’s name in her sleep those nights, but a gentle hand through her hair soothed her dreams.

One evening, one of the local children burst into the home he shared with a small collection of bachelors, summoning him to Dawa’s side. Denha was still en route home, and the baby was coming.

When he reached her, Dawa grabbed Aziraphale’s hand, and he helped her balance on her child-thick ankles, whispering plaintive blessings beneath his breath and trying to ease away the worst of her pain. He couldn’t dispel Eve’s Curse completely, but she breathed easier with his hand resting on her lower back.

It was almost morning when her baby emerged screaming into the world, half-falling into the hands of the mehaslantha kneeling on the floor before them. The old woman scrubbed the infant—a girl—in salt and wrapped her in soft cloth and passed her to Aziraphale to hold as she finished tending Dawa and seeing to the afterbirth.

When Dawa was finally allowed to relax on her bed, Aziraphale tucked her new child into her arms.

“Thank you,” she whispered to Aziraphale. “If Denha would not be here, I wanted it to be you.”

Aziraphale kissed her forehead, and passed a hand over her to bless her and her child. The baby—remarkably tiny, still warm and damp from her entry into the world—suckled at Dawa’s breast quietly. When Aziraphale touched her forehead, she barely twitched in response.

“She’s beautiful,” Aziraphale said, heart swelling insurmountably in his chest.

“Yes,” Dawa whispered, eyes drifting shut. “Yes.”

Denha returned the following day.

“Asira!” he cried, his expression one of insurmountable joy. “Come! You must be the one to name our daughter.”

Aziraphale stammered, taken completely aback, “Oh, no, I couldn’t possibly—”

“Do not deny us this,” Dawa called from their home. “Denha will name her something unworthy.”

“Quiet, wife. I have excellent ideas!”

"You would name her Suissa!"

"Why not? My horse has brought me safely home to you many times!"

Despite the casual retort, and those that followed, Denha harried after Aziraphale until, finally, he offered up the worthiest name he could think of.

Baby Khava was only a month old when Gabriel came.

“Yeah, so, word from Upstairs is these people—heathens, amirite?—have fallen a little too far from the path.” His nose scrunched. “Nature worship? What, they think that tree over there is as awesome as God? Give me a break.” He shook his head. “Idiots.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale said, relieved to finally know his assignment instead of having the uncertainty hang over his head, “My work here is to lead them to the Truth?”

“What? Pfft. No. We need you to pass a real message along, you know? We’re gonna have you kill every child in the village.”

Aziraphale’s eyes widened, suddenly light-headed as his heart began thudding painfully in his chest. It was a new sensation. He’d eventually learn it to be called ‘panic.’

“The children?” he repeated.

“Yeah, we tossed around the idea of just the firstborns, but it’s still in development.”

“All of them?”

“Keep up, Aziraphale. These people are going to serve as an important lesson to the others in the area. Get the humans’ attention, you know? Make sure we only need to say it once.” He snapped his fingers, and with a swish of his wrist, a sickle appeared in his hand. He offered it to Aziraphale, hilt-first. “Once you’re done, tell them Heaven is willing to spare any children they have in the future, but only if they stop with the whole ‘heathen’ thing.”

“I…” He thought of Dawa and her infant, who he’d left tucked up together earlier before he’d left that morning. Of the children with whom he’d played in the sand. Their parents who had worked alongside him, and taught him to honour the ground from which they grew their food. “Gabriel, surely you know this isn’t right?”

Gabriel blinked, shaking his head as though trying to clear it of an unpleasant thought. “Beg pardon?”

“We can’t kill the children in order to punish their parents. They’re innocent.”

“Uh, thanks to our little snake buddy, no one’s born innocent. And won’t be until they figure out the whole ‘baptism’ thing which, let me say, we’re not in a hurry for them to get it. Makes the paperwork a lot easier when we don’t have to process them all. Frankly, they’re breeding way faster than we imagined. It’s a clerical nightmare.” He grinned brightly. “Heh. Clerical. Sandalphon’s gonna love it.”

“I…” Aziraphale paused. A moment lasted an eternity. And finally, he whispered, “Won’t.”

Gabriel’s head tilted, rather reminiscent of a confused bird. “You what?”

“I won’t. I can’t. My conscience—”

“We haven’t even introduced the concept of conscience yet. Come on, Aziraphale. You’re an angel. All this is ordained.” He clapped Aziraphale’s arm, harder than necessary. Hard enough to bruise his corporeal form. “Do it. Or there will be consequences.” He leaned in, violet gaze boring into Aziraphale’s. “And I think you know the consequences of disobeying.”

Aziraphale took a steadying breath. Not something he needed, but fortifying nonetheless. “I would rather Fall then do what you ask.”

Gabriel considered him for a second and then shrugged. “All right then.” He leaned out of Aziraphale’s space. “Enjoy Hell, moron.”

He disappeared between heartbeats, leaving Aziraphale standing outside of his adopted home, listless and shocky, hands trembling as he twisted his fingers about each other.

The screaming began only moments later, preceded by a burst of lightning from the cloudless sky. Another angel, come to do Gabriel’s bidding.

Aziraphale twisted in his place, only to find himself unable to move. Unable to intervene. Unable to do anything save listen to the howls of weeping mothers and screams of bereaved fathers. He fought against the invisible force gluing him to the ground until the bones in his legs shattered beneath the weight of his own struggles. The day passed through to night and towards morning before he was finally released from whatever held him.

He crawled back to the village to help with the last rites. His heart bled for them, and many of them could not look him in the eye. Could he blame them when his own kind had brought about their suffering? Dawa would not leave her home, and Denha closed their door to him. There was no communal fire in the evening. No joyful words. The only thing left was stand witness to the mourning of an entire generation.

The next morning, he walked into the wilderness and away from humanity for a very, very long time.

* * *

“I never Fell,” Aziraphale repeated into his wine. “Gabriel told me if I disobeyed I would Fall. I don’t know why it never happened.” He allowed his wings to unfold from the ether, and he carefully stretched them out to show off the iridescently white feathers. “I was barred from Heaven. I’ve tried to return once or twice over the years, but every time it’s as though I’m walking headfirst into a concrete wall. But, for all my sins, I remain an angel.”

“An abandoned angel,” Crowley mused.

Aziraphale offered up a wan smile. “Yes. Quite.”

“You know what I say?” Crowley asked. Aziraphale quirked an eyebrow. “_Fuck. Them._ Bunch of pribbling tossers. Not even sure what you’d want with them anyway.”

Aziraphale conjured up the empty ghost of a smile. “I will admit to their terrible taste in music.”

“And wine!” Crowley cawed. “It’s rubbish. Probably nothing but cheap red you could buy for a pound at Tesco.”

“It’s sacramental, dear. I don’t think you’re supposed to drink it for its quality.”

“Pffft, I met Jesus. He would’ve wanted at least a tenner.”

Aziraphale snorted out a laugh, and then blinked at himself in surprise. Crowley grinned ear-to-ear and topped up his glass. “There we go. Have another.”

They drank deeply, Crowley migrating from one end of the couch to the other, occasionally casting suspicious glares at the baby monitor, as though he was waiting for Adam to wake up crying, though he’d fairly reliably slept this past month through the night.

“I often wondered, had they sent someone else the assignment, what would have become of me,” Aziraphale murmured into his cup. 

Despite himself, the words caught in his throat. He’d never wanted to Fall. He merely hadn’t wanted to pay the price of staying in Heaven. He still longed for it: to return to God’s grace, and stand before Her throne. But even the longing felt disingenuous, considering he would have made the same decision a thousand times over.

Crowley shifted again, finally dropping himself to splay across the cushions between them, his head only inches away from Aziraphale’s thigh. With his eyes closed, it gave Aziraphale a moment to study him; the sharp lines of his cheeks and chin, and the curling tattoo at his temple. Over the centuries, memories of Crowley had faded. Aziraphale had avoided seeking out anything ethereal or occult, determined if he should be banished to Earth for the rest of eternity, it would be masochistic to find ways to remind himself of what he’d lost. And despite his demonic nature, Crowley had been a reminder. When he’d arrived at Aziraphale’s door, soaked to the bone, it had been an agonizing throwback to the first thunderstorm and watching Adam and Eve from the Garden wall. All at once, the torture of his banishment returned to him, and yet he could never have sent Crowley and Adam away.

“Exiling you from Heaven was the stupidest thing they ever did,” Crowley whispered, head lolling to the side. His wineglass was precariously held between his thumb and forefinger, at constant risk of falling from his hand. Aziraphale slipped it out of his hand and placed it on the nearby table.

“I’m sure Gabriel would disagree.”

“_Fuck_ Gabriel,” Crowley growled. "They're not worthy of you, angel." The word--an endearment?--slipped carelessly from his lips, but didn’t sting the way it might have, had Crowley not been the one saying it.

"To bed with you, my dear. I’ll go check on Adam,” he said quietly.

Crowley’s eyebrow twitched, though his eyes remained shut. “Hmm? My job, isn’t it?”

Aziraphale smiled fondly and shook his head. “Not at all.”

"Mmm," Crowley opened his eyes. "Missed your coffee in the mornings. Can't get a decent cuppa in France, can't get a decent coffee in London."

"Now I'm sure that's not true," Aziraphale chided. "Think of all those poor business owners trying to do their best..." He trailed off, heading towards the stairs. The whole way, he sensed Crowley's gaze fixed upon his back.

* * *

As Crowley had expected, his flat had been completely destroyed in his absence. He'd returned from London without any of the vast number of keepsakes he'd hoped more than expected to save. It had all the earmarks of an attack from Hell—the typical vandalism, refuse and undirected destruction—but smelled of Flosiel's geranium-scented halitosis. The lattermost especially prominent in his room, where Adam’s generous collection of possessions had been smote practically to microbes.

The most devastating personal loss, however, was his atrium. Many of those plants he’d raised from seeds, with only the strongest surviving his loving attentions. And while he hadn’t expected to find them alive, he hadn’t thought to discover their boxes and planters upended, and signs of hellfire scorching the floor where they’d been cast aside.

“Poor dear,” Aziraphale murmured. “I hadn’t realized you had an affinity for plants.”

Crowley grumbled. “Supposed to be relaxing, isn’t it?”

Aziraphale nodded thoughtfully. “It is, at that.”

Heaven was still after them, apparently. It set him on edge the moment he'd left, and took a full month after his return to the chateau to begin calming his nerves.

One afternoon, after lunch, Aziraphale declared his intention to visit his neighbour and perform the long-anticipated vine swap. It was all very cloak-and-dagger—Aziraphale even broke out an ancient-looking felt fedora, which Crowley doubted had seen the light of day since the Forties. He resisted the urge to make fun of the angel, but it was a near thing and ate up the entirety of his willpower for the rest of the century.

"I'd invite you to come, dear, but my supplier is supposed to be dropping off a shipment of corks, and I'd vastly prefer to have them stored right in the winery instead of left outside."

"Yes, yes," Crowley said airily, waving him off. Adam was close to walking, he could sense it. He wiggled on the ground in his best impersonation of Crowley himself, but any moment he was going to figure out how to get his legs up beneath him and stand on his own. "Have fun."

If Aziraphale said goodbye, Crowley barely noticed.

Half an hour later, Adam was clinging to a table leg and babbling in severe irritation when the delivery came. Along with the sizable supplies of corks, the courier handed over a letter smelling of half-decent perfume. Crowley absently directed him, attention fixed on the letter.

"Had your dalliances, eh?" Crowley muttered. He set the letter down on the credenza next to the door, determined to ignore it, and then spent the next hour fixated on the contents.

Adam screeched in displeasure, lip quivering in prelude to what was likely going to be an impressive tantrum, and Crowley scooped him up.

"What about some light reading, then?" he suggested. He carried Adam into the kitchen, collecting the letter along the way. Setting Adam in his saucer with a handful of cereal, he settled down on the floor beside him. "What did you and the angel get up to while I was gone, hmm?" He glared at the envelope until the glue came loose, then gently eased out the contents. Whoever was sending his angel love letters favoured typing over handwriting, which he might have told them was the utterly wrong thing to do, if asked. (In truth, he would have encouraged it, along with suggesting snippets of Donne, if poetry were to be included; Aziraphale hated "The Flea" with word-defying passion.)

_Dear Mr. Fell,_

Horrible opening. Or did Aziraphale make all his lovers address him formally?

_I wanted to write and thank you for the amazing experience we had at _Château de l'Ange Abandonné_. Not only for the wine, but for sharing a glimpse into your family’s history. You’ve truly converted Jasmine away from beer (though I don’t know how any wine will ever live up to what you shared) and I’m waiting for the day when we can finally share the bottle you generously gifted us. _

_I published my write up on your winery on my blog. I know you don’t have internet, so I’ve printed it out for you. My blog doesn’t have wide readership, and I doubt it will encourage very many visitors to go out of their way to find you, but it’s their loss. I hope my travels will bring me back to Provence someday. _

_All the best,_

_Heather._

Relief boiled nauseous in Crowley's stomach and he tamped down the feeling through force of will alone. It wasn’t as though it _mattered_ to him if his angel entertained company in his absence. Not at all. As long as Adam was safe.

Adam smacked his hands on the side of his saucer, and Crowley absently scattered another handful of unsweetened cereal on the tray, turning the page over to read the printout.

He was momentarily taken aback by the picture attached. He’d been expecting Aziraphale holding a bottle of wine, or pouring a glass. Instead, he was treated to the sight of him holding Adam aloft, his face absolutely effused with joy. Crowley stared at it for longer than he should have, unaccountably taken aback. The picture was black and white, and he suddenly wished for internet access to see it in its full glory of colour. Adam was laughing, reaching for Aziraphale, both of them in profile.

It took him longer than it should have to focus on the words.

Château de l'Ange Abandonné_ is one of the hidden treasures of Provence, and should share some of the incredible reputation enjoyed by the other longstanding wineries in the area. Owned by the same family since 730 BCE, this incredible winery produces only 250 cases of wine every year, and while those wines are not for sale, they’ve become a white rhino for collectors. Sotheby’s offered up two bottles—one red and one white—during one of their auctions last year, and the bottles individually fetched over $10,000 USD a piece. It may seem ludicrous to pay such an excessive amount for wine, but when it comes to the _Château de l'Ange Abandonné_, you’re not only paying for the wine itself, but for the incredible journey each glass will take you on. _

_When we arrived at the Chateau, we were greeted at the door by the current owner, as well as the next generation (pictured, top right: owner and vintner A.Z. Fell and his son, Adam). My travelling companion and I were whisked off on a tour of the incredible cellar, treated to a small sliver of the vineyard’s history, and were then seated in their elegant tasting room to enjoy a flight of five wines which, honestly, almost made me want to go back to church, because this is the sort of flight they have to serve in Heaven._

“As though they stock anything half as good,” Crowley sniffed. Adam stuffed his entire fist in his mouth in agreement, struggling to open his fingers to release the cereal within.

_While I could wax rhapsodic on the entire flight—and will, later on—what struck me was the quiet, family atmosphere of the Chateau. His son accompanied us on our tour, and every time Mr. Fell spoke of his partner, it was with such love and adoration it made me regret we’d visited while the other man was overseas. Mr. Fell says with an expansive grin, “I think he only tolerates me when I begin to drone on about wine, but I’ve never enjoyed wine more than when I share it with him.” _

Crowley blinked owlishly at the words, re-reading them several times; as though Aziraphale could ever enjoy wine more than he already did. And who was this partner to whom they kept referring?

(It took him an embarassingly long moment to realize it was himself.)

_When I asked if their son would be following in the family footsteps, Mr. Fell laughed, and proclaimed, “I certainly hope he prefers winemaking.”_

Crowley snorted.

_Despite the impressive winery, the real joy came during the flight. “Listen to me, babbling on, when I’m sure you’re here for the wine.” Actually, the little undergrad of my heart who minored in history was soaking everything up like a sponge; Mr. Fell has a way of describing the history of the vineyard which makes it seem as though he’s lived through it—the stories passed down through generations must really be something. He poured us five glasses, starting with one of the red blends from the oldest and most established vines. _

_Drinking this wine was like waking up in a fairy tale. Imagine walking through a forest, thick canopy overhead trapping in cool air ripe with the smell of moss, mushrooms and dark earth. You find yourself approaching a cedar log cabin, and upon one of the window sills sits a fresh-baked blueberry pie. The first bite you take immediately hits you with salivating baking spices levered gently into the crust, rich blueberries and a hint of vanilla, all supported by a fleshy body and a tannic structure that has to be experienced to be believed._

_Mr. Fell followed it up with one of the newer red blends…_

Crowley stopped reading; there was only so much he could absorb when it came to others describing Aziraphale’s wines. Especially when he had something else to chew over.

_…every time Mr. Fell spoke of his partner, it was with such love and adoration…_

Fuck.

Adam babbled nonsense at him, and Crowley abandoned the article on the table to scoop him up. “What are we do to about this, hmm?” he asked.

Adam solemnly punched his chin.

Aziraphale returned late into the evening, after Adam had already been fed and tucked into bed. In his arms, a small collection of potted vines, only stalks really, only one or two in possession of their first leaves. Crowley looked at them skeptically.

“Not much, are they?”

Aziraphale smiled beatifically. “They will be.”

Crowley wasn't as accomplished a cook, but he'd managed a relatively decent goat cheese and tomato omelette, which he knew paired nicely with some of Aziraphale's 2002 rosé. the acidity held up to the goat cheese, and rather than distracting from the tomato, gave it a beautiful floral finish which created fusion instead of confusion in his mouth.

From the blissed-out look on Aziraphale's face, the angel quite agreed.

"Excellent, my dear. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was."

Crowley pushed his own dinner around his plate, chasing it with the prongs of his fork, but not committing to it. He'd never felt the consuming need to... well. Consume. Until he'd landed on Aziraphale's front step. And perhaps it was more the sharing of meals that meant something, rather than the eating.

He was pleased with the pairing, though.

"You received some mail today," Crowley said, gesturing to the letter—unopened, by all appearances—on the china hutch.

"Oh?" Aziraphale retrieved it and settled back in his chair to read it over. "Ah. Such lovely and polite young women. I do enjoy it when humans remember how manners work." Crowley couldn't fathom having even entertained the thought Aziraphale had taken a lover, not when he viewed the majority of humanity with the same warm condescension most humans might view a particularly charming lemur. "Oh, I do like her write up of my 1996 rosé. Look, she captured the herbal finish, everyone seems to overlook the notes of thyme because the cherry can be so overwhelming..."

Crowley shook his head, feeling disgusting levels of fondness fizz up through his chest.

"You note that she refers to Adam as your son," Crowley pointed out.

Was it his imagination, or was there a slight tremble in Aziraphale's hands? "So she does." He refolded the letter and placed it down beside his plate. "I hope you don't feel I'm stepping on your toes, my dear."

Crowley's brow furrowed. "Why would I?"

Speechless, Aziraphale finished his dinner and stood to clear away the plates, apparently aware of the enormity of Crowley’s declaration as he silently dropped them into the sink to be dealt with in the morning.

"Do you consider him yours?" Crowley pressed as Aziraphale passed behind him to head towards the kitchen door. He was treading in dangerous territory, he knew. He could still clearly see Aziraphale's face in his mind's eye from the other evening, when he'd discussed the children in Assyria.

"I." Aziraphale's face contorted, as though he was trying to decide between crying and smiling. "I am privileged and honoured to have you both here, with me. I've been… lonely."

Quite the admission, pulled though it was in a quiet, shattered whisper. Didn't answer Crowley’s question, however.

"Adam loves you," Crowley pointed out. "He won't eat oatmeal for me, you know."

Aziraphale huffed out a half-broken laugh. He started again for the door, but before he could take more than a step past the table, Crowley’s hand shot out and caught him about the wrist.

“That article,” Crowley said. Aziraphale blinked. “The blog. She said you talked about me.”

“Well, why wouldn’t I? You’ve become… very dear to me, Crowley. Very dear indeed.”

Crowley blinked up at Aziraphale, forehead creasing as a thousand unaskable, unanswerable questions ran through his mind.

Aziraphale brushed his free fingers against the hand holding his trapped wrist. “I’m so, so very glad you’re here.”

Crowley’s hand tightened against his skin. When Aziraphale pulled back, Crowley used the momentum to lever himself up out of his chair. Aziraphale, startled, tripped backwards, and Crowley followed, dancing him back until he was pressed against the kitchen wall.

"Crowley?" Aziraphale whispered.

For a moment, Crowley was worried he'd read it all wrong. And then Aziraphale's gaze darted down to Crowley's mouth. It was barely a heartbeat, but enough for Crowley to Know. He pressed his mouth to Aziraphale's, chaste for a terrifying moment before Aziraphale's lips opened beneath his. The wine lingered in his mouth—the gentle tannins seated in his cheeks and passing into Crowley's mouth, making his own ache in response. He kissed hesitantly, as though afraid this, too, would be snatched away from him.

When he pulled away, Aziraphale's eyes—they’d closed at some point—opened to him. Before Aziraphale could pull himself out of Crowley's hold, Crowley lurched forwards, catching Aziraphale’s lips again. His scarred palm cupped Aziraphale’s cheek, anchoring him in place as they discovered the taste of each other. Beneath the generous strawberry and white fruit notes of his wine, Aziraphale tasted like the air before a lighting strike.

Aziraphale’s free hand came to rest on Crowley’s clavicle, caressing the bare skin peeking above the collar of his shirt, surprisingly warm considering the night air. “Please,” he whispered into Crowley’s mouth.

Crowley’s hands slipped up under his shirt and Aziraphale gasped as his fingertips trailed along his waist. “Too fast?”

“I’ve been on my own for six thousand years,” Aziraphale said quietly. “You can’t go too fast for me, my dearest.”

“Take me upstairs, then,” Crowley murmured, punctuating his words with a soft nip to Aziraphale’s lower lip.

Aziraphale tilted his head back. “I’d rather you take me.”

Grinning wolfishly, Crowley complied.

There hadn't been a bed in Aziraphale's room the last time Crowley had gotten a peek inside. Or, he hadn't spotted it, buried beneath stacks of books. He sent the books tumbling to the floor with a quick flick of his wrist and, when Aziraphale shot him an outraged glower, flicked again to stack them in neat piles next to the window.

"Have a care, dearheart," Aziraphale scolded, undermining his disapproval with a kiss to Crowley's neck. He trailed soft lips up to Crowley's ear, and bit down on the lobe.

"Believe me, I do," Crowley responded.

They moved slowly together, each caress of skin against skin a small eternity. Crowley laved Aziraphale’s nipples with his tongue for hours, memorizing the pebbly texture of them and bringing them to sharp peaks. Aziraphale, in return, found the small stretch of skin above Crowley’s jugular which caused his hips to twitch desperately upwards.

“Let me,” Crowley begged, flipping them over.

“Please.”

When he finally slid into his angel, Aziraphale cried out loud enough to bring down the roof. Crowley covered his mouth with his own, drinking down the sound of it. Small moans hitched deep in Aziraphale’s throat and Crowley caught each and every one.

They neither of them lasted long. Crowley was drunk on Aziraphale’s skin, the sounds and sight of him falling apart beneath him. Overcome, he buried his teeth in Aziraphale’s shoulder as he came to stop the waterfall of sentimentality threatening to spill past his lips. Aziraphale whined, cried out, and followed quickly afterwards.

Crowley remained languid and sated atop Aziraphale until the angel poked him and he gamely rolled to the side. He refused to leave the bed, however, content to stay exactly where he was. Aziraphale reached for his hand, twining their fingers tightly together.

“In the article, she said you loved me,” Crowley whispered into the night.

“Well,” Aziraphale returned quietly, “Humans can be remarkably observant.”

Crowley rolled over to kiss him again.

Later, much later, Aziraphale interrupted Crowley’s casual doze by saying, “I’ve been thinking about something.”

“Dangerous,” Crowley replied.

Aziraphale swatted his arm. “The vines I brought home. I thought you might… want them.” Crowley rose on his elbow and regarded Aziraphale with a slightly raised eyebrow. “And the empty acre. I was rather hoping you’d enjoy being a part of this with me.”

Crowley leaned over and kissed Aziraphale very deeply indeed.

* * *

The days passed quickly towards summer. Crowley embraced the challenge of getting the bourboulenc vines settled. Aziraphale would often find him in the back acre, hovering over the stalks as they inched upwards and whispering threats to their continued existence if they failed to produce abundant, perfect grapes. Aziraphale told him the first half-decade of crops were generally meagre and unusable, and he’d had planned to use them for compost, but Crowley was determined to get them in shape through whatever means necessary.

“I’m not sure if terror is going to instill the right bouquet, dearest,” Aziraphale said mildly.

Crowley glowered at the vines. “Oh, they’ll give us all the bouquet we need.” The new leaves trembled in response.

The morning Adam took his first steps, they were seated at the kitchen table, companionably enjoying their coffee and keeping a half-eye on him as he played with his stuffed hedgehog. He tossed it across the kitchen and, instead of crawling after it, used Crowley’s chair to pull himself up.

Crowley and Aziraphale watched, barely breathing, as he released the chair and took two, tiny steps forward before plopping back down.

“Darling!” Aziraphale said. He swooped in and peppered Adam’s face with kisses. “How wonderful you are!”

“Can you do it again?” Crowley asked.

“Ba!” Adam agreed. Aziraphale placed him back on the floor, and Crowley jumped out of his chair, kneeling a few feet away and holding out his arms. Adam, with surprising focus for a not-quite-one-year-old, stepped forward. Aziraphale’s fingers were still gripped in his chubby fingers, but when Aziraphale wouldn’t stand to help him, he released them and continued onwards. Just a few steps before he sat back down on his bum, but enough.

“Brilliant job, little beast,” Crowley told him.

“This calls for a celebration,” Aziraphale declared. “Go fetch a bottle of the 1914 red blend, will you? I’m going into town.”

“He doesn’t need any sweets, angel,” Crowley called after him.

Aziraphale flapped a hand. As though they couldn’t have some small treat to acknowledge Adam’s accomplishments.

“And I suppose now I’m going to have to be the one to finish the babyproofing!”

“Good luck, dear. I’ll bring home lunch.”

It was a lovely day, and his steps had a certain bounce in them as he made his way to town. He stopped by the market, and spent more than he probably should have on duck pâté en croûte and a generous knob of foie gras.

“You are in a good mood today, M. Fell!”

“Adam is walking,” Aziraphale replied, delighted to have someone to share the news with.

The butcher grinned, waxed rhapsodical about his own children—in much the same way his father had waxed rhapsodical about him—and sent him off with his compliments.

Marie was more enthusiastic. Possibly because, when he arrived, Aziraphale presented her with one of his long-awaited bottles of fortified viognier. 

“I’m sure your husband is over the moon,” she proclaimed. Without asking, she popped one of Crowley’s favourites, a luscious _tarte normande aux pommes_ into a box.

“He is,” Azirpahale replied, warmed through by the assessment. And, perhaps, the reference to Crowley as his husband.

She sent him away with all their favourites, and tucked a small bundle of madeleines into the bag with a wink.

He’d barely turned from the counter when a cool feeling of dread washed over him. Had he been human, gooseflesh would’ve broken out across his arms. As such, all he wanted to do was drop his purchases and run.

He stepped outside, scanning the road either way. Between one heartbeat and the next, a soft whish of air preceded a loud exclamation of, “Ah! Sugar. Excellent. I love stuffing my gob with unhealthy amounts of non-nutritious matter.”

Were Aziraphale the sort of angel who cursed… No. He was. “Fuck,” he whispered. He slowly turned around. Gabriel stood behind him, peering through the window of Marie’s bakery and dripping with silent disdain.

Thousands of years without contact, and now they sought him out? There would never be a coincidence of such unprecedented enormity in the entirety of existence. Anxiety boiled in Aziraphale’s stomach, creeping up to dwell below his sternum in ball of cold dread, lurking in anticipation of what was to come.

“Gabriel,” he greeted, trying to sound unaffected. How would he have greeted the archangel before Crowley had come to stay? Fallen at his feet and thanked him for his presence? No. Not when he could still hear the cries of the parents in the unnamed settlement as they mourned their children. “What do you want?”

“Is that all the greeting you’re going to offer me?” Gabriel demanded.

Aziraphale kept his face neutral and his gaze cool. This being had asked the unthinkable of him, and then spent well over five and a half millennia helping enforce Aziraphale’s expulsion from Heaven. He owed him no courtesies.

Aziraphale waited him out until Gabriel huffed out an annoyed breath. “I’ve come to see if there’s been any… unusual demonic activity around these parts, lately.”

“Demons don’t typically bother me,” Aziraphale replied. “I believe there’s an angel assigned to Earth who draws most of their attention.”

“Flosiel, yeah. Stand up guy.” Aziraphale deigned not comment on that particular assessment. “I bet you’re wondering why I’m asking.”

“As you’ve made clear to me, the concerns of Heaven are no longer my own.”

“Well. You might want to consider this a concern for all existence.” Gabriel grinned brightly. “The Antichrist has been born, and the final days are upon us!”

“Huzzah,” Aziraphale deadpanned.

Gabriel trundled forward. “Here’s the thing, a little snag in the plans… he’s gone astray.”

“Oh? Well. What can you expect from children, after all?”

“No, no, no. He’s only an infant. Couldn’t have taken off on his own. Stolen, actually, by a demon who, frankly, must’ve gone completely off the rails if he thinks it’s going to stop anything. We’ve been scouring the globe for him, but can’t seem to put our hands on him.”

It was no small miracle that Adam was undetectable by the divine or profane, though Aziraphale hadn’t considered it to be a particular risk. He’d flexed all his miraculous powers through wars and revolutions, and one particularly nasty incident involving a lion in a suit of armour, all without comment. He’d long ago made peace with Heaven ignoring what yet tied him to their grace.

“I’m surprised you’re concerned about his whereabouts at all, if you don’t think it will change the course of things.”

“Well, wouldn’t do to let one demon have more influence than the others.” He waved at Marie through the window as she came to retrieve one of the pastries for another customer. She frowned at him, but tentatively waved back. “We thought you might be willing to help.”

Aziraphale sniffed. “So sorry, but my days are sacrosanct. I haven’t the time to go looking for a missing Antichrist.” Strictly true. He was much too busy with the Antichrist currently living in his home.

Gabriel smiled, though it was more a pull of his lips upwards, completely bereft of emotion; a pale mimicry of human expression. “Not even if it means your redemption?”

The globe of anxiety in his gut swelled. When he replied, it was with a broken gasp. “I beg your pardon?”

“In exchange for your help, we’re willing to allow you re-entry into Heaven.” Gabriel clapped his shoulder, as he had all those millennia ago. Once again, the blow was bruising. Once again, Aziraphale found himself speechless.

His mouth opened and shut several times, his lips fluttering around the myriad questions. “How can you? If God herself passed along my banishment…”

“Well.” Gabriel tilted back on his heels, looking particularly pleased with himself. “If it had been Her, it’d be a different story. But it was our call. We were interpreting Her will.”

_Interpreting Her will?!_

“Come on, Aziraphale.” Gabriel leaned in close. “Don’t you finally want to come home?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for mild violence in this chapter!

When Aziraphale returned from town, he was uncharacteristically silent. Usually, Crowley was treated to a long-winded recap of the daily to-do of their neighbours—most of which he tuned out, if he was being perfectly honest. Instead, Aziraphale set himself to preparing lunch, unusually sombre, and barely noticed when Crowley put a glass of the ’01 rosé down at his elbow.

It was in Crowley’s nature to pester, prod, and provoke until he found answers. Always had been. Why he’d been summarily dismissed from Heaven, after all. Yet there was something in the angel’s silence sitting cold as a ball of ice in his lower intestine.

“Adam walked again,” he finally offered.

“Splendid,” Aziraphale said, absently.

He put out a plate of pâté en croûte, expertly seared foie gras, cheese, pickles, olives, and a few cured meats. And he then proceeded to not touch a smidgen of it, staring blankly into the near distance, even when Adam reached for him from his high chair. Aziraphale took hold of his hand and quickly kissed his fingers, but his gaze remained resolutely fixed on nothing.

“Gabriel was in the village,” Aziraphale said, at length.

Crowley was up out of his seat instantly, stalking towards the windows and looking out over the vineyard. “Is he still here?” The ice expanded. “Did he… do something?”

“He offered me the opportunity to return to Heaven,” Aziraphale said. The words were hollow, not an inkling of emotion behind them. And he was still sporting the blessed, unblinking thousand-yard stare. “If I would assist them in finding Adam.”

Crowley froze. Turned from the window and half-collapsed back into his chair. Aziraphale was close to Adam. He still had the toddler’s fingers clasped gently in his hand. It would be infinitely easy for him to scoop Adam up and run. He played it all out in his head; Crowley had an excellent imagination. Crowley would give chase, and maybe manage to get Adam away for a few precious seconds before Gabriel and his feathery friends showed up. And then there would be no more running. No more hiding. No more anything, Crowley suspected, for himself anyway, and a life for Adam which made him shudder to think on. Aziraphale, forgiven and redeemed, could reclaim his place in Heaven. Everything nicely sorted until the looming Apocalypse.

It took him a moment to find his voice, “Should we expect them for dinner?”

Finally, Aziraphale turned his gaze towards Crowley. “Do you think that of me?” There was no recrimination or accusation behind the words. No emotion at all, really. Crowley wondered if this… _disassociation_ or whatever it was, had marked Aziraphale’s years wandering the earth without company.

“No,” Crowley finally said, surprised to find he meant it. “’Course not.”

Aziraphale took a shuddering breath, and kissed Adam’s fingers again, quickly, before releasing them and offering him a tiny cube of cheese.

Another uneasy silence.

“I should tell you,” Aziraphale muttered, his eyebrows twitching as they were wont to do when he was confessing something scandalous. “I seriously considered doing harm to an archangel today.”

Crowley blinked and sat back in his chair, “Pardon?” 

“It seems my expulsion from Heaven wasn’t the work of God, but rather Gabriel and his cronies deciding it was what She wanted.” Aziraphale sniffed. “How many millennia have I spent, trying to conciliate myself with having displeased Her, only to find out She hasn’t expressed an opinion on the matter either way.” He shook his head, as though clearing the cobwebs, and refocused on Adam. “It’s all rather a lot to take in.”

"What did you do?"

"I suggested Gabriel go investigate trephination firsthand as a cure for whatever ailed him."

Crowley stared as Aziraphale slipped Adam a cube of pungent Roquefort. Adam stuck it in his mouth and his face twisted up as he considered it before opening his mouth and letting the spit-covered chunk fall out onto his bib. Aziraphale finally chuckled and miracled the mushy cheese away. He replaced it with a small piece of prosciutto, which Adam regarded with deep suspicion. The glare intensified, until the meat decided it was far better off being one of Adam’s favourite cheese crackers, and obligingly shifted itself around to suit.

Crowley and Aziraphale stared.

“Did he…” Aziraphale began, eyes regaining some of their usual clarity.

“Well, little beast,” Crowley said, sweeping in and peppering his face with kisses. “Haven’t you learned a clever trick.”

Adam giggled and shoved the cracker into his mouth.

* * *

Crowley was late to bed. Aziraphale listened to him over the baby monitor, singing softly to Adam well past when the toddler had drifted off to sleep. Aziraphale waited in his chair next to the fire, banked low in deference to the slow-warming spring air.

When Crowley finally did reappear, it was with little fanfare. He slumped into the room and dropped down on the bed, shifting about until he was finally facing Aziraphale, head tucked into his crossed arms.

“I never thought you’d sold us out,” Crowley promised him. “That was all Hell talking.”

A weight lifted off Aziraphale’s chest. “Heaven doesn’t hold the appeal it did, once. Knowing I’ve managed to find a piece of it here and now, I don’t miss it the way I might’ve, had I still been alone.”

Crowley smiled for a bare second before his expression shifted into something more akin to concern. “And if Gabriel came to you before I’d shown up with Adam?” he ventured, caution dripping from his tone.

“No matter when he’d told me, I would have been hard-pressed to forgive him. And now I’m not inclined to do so in the slightest.” He offered a half-smile. “I’m not a violent being, but when Gabriel told me he was the one to ban me from Heaven, I honestly wished—only for a moment, mind—that I was.”

Crowley chuckled. Then, sliding up from the bed, he crept across the floor between them. Aziraphale put his book aside to allow Crowley to drop into his lap, and braced the demon’s hips in his hands.

“You know, I’ve found I quite enjoy the whole… fucking thing,” Crowley said. “Never had much use for it before.”

“I think I’d prefer we use a less crass term for it,” Aziraphale informed him.

“Such as?”

The words caught in Aziraphale’s throat. The smile slipped from Crowley’s face as he read whatever emotions passed across Aziraphale’s face. He leaned in and kissed him, softer than he’d ever kissed Aziraphale before.

“Yes,” Crowley whispered, pulling back. “That. _Love_. Messy business, but here we are.”

The past months had defied all Aziraphale’s expectations of a lonely life lived in perpetuum. He stretched up to catch Crowley’s mouth again. The kiss was less soft this time, and quickly turned into something heated.

“I love you,” Aziraphale whispered, the words punctuated by the slide of Crowley’s lips against his.

Crowley pulled himself up, and dragged Aziraphale against him. Their _love-making_—what a delightful way to express it, for all Crowley groaned when Aziraphale whispered it against his chest—was slow to the point of agonizing. Crowley’s hands twisted in the sheets as Aziraphale worshipped him with his hands and tongue, murmuring soft endearments across every inch of his skin.

“I wouldn’t dream of giving this up. Of giving _you_ up,” Aziraphale promised him, buried deep in Crowley’s body. He gave the barest of thrusts and Crowley’s fingers scrabbled for purchase in the sheets.

“Angel,” he groaned.

“We _will_ make sure Adam loves this world enough to save it,” Aziraphale said with another small twitch of his hips. “And once he’s turned from that path, I will spend the next six thousand years making up for all six thousand years we’ve lived apart.”

“Yessss,” Crowley hissed. Before Aziraphale could say another word, Crowley canted his hips up and swung around, flipping them over and pressing Aziraphale down to the bed beneath him. “I didn’t know I was waiting for you.”

It was Aziraphale’s turn to groan, and he grabbed hold of Crowley’s waist, holding tight as Crowley set pace to a merciless rhythm atop him. Neither of them lasted long, and when Crowley came with a shout, Aziraphale followed close behind.

Crowley slumped down atop Aziraphale’s chest, and the angel raised shaky arms to wrap around him, keeping him in place.

“My own dearest love,” Aziraphale murmured against his ear. “I love you.”

“You do,” Crowley gasped, breathless. He turned his head to press a half-desperate kiss to Aziraphale’s mouth. “And I do.”

“Splendid,” Aziraphale said, half-sensible. Crowley laughed and kissed him again. He miracled away the mess, and allowed Crowley to summon up a thick knit quilt. They lay wrapped up in each other’s embrace until dawn.

* * *

For Adam’s first birthday, Aziraphale commissioned a croquembouche from Marie. A hundred delicate profiteroles filled with white chocolate and rose pastry cream, held together by brilliantly decadent hard caramel. She embellished it with edible flowers and a handful of macarons for colour, making it almost too beautiful for Aziraphale to bear. Marie even came all the way out to the chateau to deliver it, in her brother’s old truck.

“You’ve truly outdone yourself,” he salivated. He took it from her and manfully avoided the urge to unstick one of the macarons. “This is gorgeous work, Marie.”

“Thank you, M. Fell,” she said with a sweet smile. From her oversized purse, she produced a small wrapped gift. “For the birthday boy.”

“Oh, Marie, you needn’t have.”

“My pleasure. Truly.” She set it down next to the door. “Where is he? And your husband?”

“Out in the vineyard,” Aziraphale replied. “Under orders not to come back until dinnertime. I’m planning quite the to-do for us.”

“Well, have a lovely evening.” She touched his hand once, fondly, and saw herself out. Aziraphale watched after her with a small smile, and—with a flick of his fingers—offered up a quick blessing for her safe drive home.

He ferried the croquembouche to the kitchen and set it down at the centre of the table. Adam had a decided preference for fish, and Aziraphale had managed to get his hands on a smashing bit of sole, most of which he cooked _en meuni__ère_. He already had a bottle of ’97 breathing on the counter, and some fresh bread baking in the oven. All in all, he was expecting a wonderful night.

Which was, of course, why the knock on the door immediately sent a bolt of annoyance stiffening down his spine.

Marie must have forgotten to close the gate behind her; he knew the side door was locked. He poked the sole to ensure it wasn’t in danger of overcooking, and swept back to the front door to send off whoever had come to visit.

“I’m afraid we’re…” He trailed off, eyes widening when he saw the angel on the other side of the door.

“Aziraphale,” Flosiel said, grinning ear-to-ear. It rather brought to mind a moray eel. For all the denizens of Hell were the ones who supposedly came across as animalistic, there was something unsettling in the angel’s demeanour. “How long has it been?”

“Not long enough,” Aziraphale whispered. Crowley’s stories jumped to the forefront of his mind; millennia of discorporating each other in a game which might’ve been cheerful, had it not been for the wicked glee Flosiel took in finding the most uncomfortable, painful methods. _Penance for my sins_, Crowley had said, _That’s what he called it when he cut me open and stuffed me full of hot coals. Itched to the lower Hells. Prat probably forgot fire doesn’t do much to a demon._

“Manners, renegade.” Flosiel tried to brush by him and step inside, but Aziraphale held firm.

“As I told Gabriel, I’m not interested in this wild goose chase you’re on.”

“Obviously. What does it matter to you? Once the Final Days are upon us, and the world has ended in flame and blood, you’re going to be sluffed off to oblivion for the rest of eternity.”

“It’s time for you to go,” Aziraphale said, barely managing to keep the tremors from his voice.

“Touched a nerve, have I?” Flosiel leaned against the doorframe, watching Aziraphale with such lovely jade eyes it almost made up for the cruelty within. There was more than cruelty, though. A sense of… victory? “Fear isn’t becoming of an angel, but I suppose it’s not much concern of yours.”

“You have a point to all this, I imagine,” Aziraphale whispered. “Get to it.”

“Gabriel came to see me the other day. Mentioned he’d sought you out, hoping to get you onboard. And I couldn’t for the life of me figure out _why_ you’d refused him. You must be terrified of what comes next. You’d be stupid not to be. While the rest of us are celebrating our triumph, you’ll be sitting outside the gates forever. It makes me wonder why you’d refuse the chance to come home. What in the world would stop you from helping, if it means you could finally sluff off this sorry ball of clay and ash and walk back into Heaven?

“And then I realized: it’s nothing of this world, is it? _You have it_.”

“No,” Aziraphale shook his head.

“Yes. You want to use him to get back into Heaven, one way or another.” Flosiel stepped forward, his chest a hairsbreadth from Aziraphale’s. “I don’t blame you. I hate it down here. I would start the War tomorrow if I could. And I’m not going to let anyone make me stay here for a minute longer than necessary. Which means you’re going to hand it over, and maybe I won’t do too much damage before I take it away.”

Aziraphale had never been much of a fighter. He’d wielded his sword in the First Battle, and considered himself well rid of it the moment he pressed the hilt into Adam’s hand. But with Flosiel darkening his door, he accepted he would have to fight—and kill—if he wanted to protect Crowley and Adam. But it couldn’t be a simple discorporation. If Flosiel’s body died, he’d return to Heaven and bring the entire rest of the Host down with him. It had to be permanent.

Aziraphale had no way of permanently killing an angel.

All of this took a heartbeat to realize, which was a heartbeat too long. Flosiel whipped out his sickle, heavenly fire crackling white hot along the edge as he swept it across the space between them. Aziraphale’s skin blistered in response, though it healed again almost immediately. He was still an angel; holy fire couldn’t injure him for long. The blade concerned him more.

“Come here, renegade,” Flosiel crooked a finger. “I have a date with your wings.”

* * *

Crowley flicked his fingers to clean them—and the rest of his clothing—of dirt and stood, stepping away from his small collection of budding vines. Adam played in the dirt nearby, occasionally glancing Crowley’s way as he considered whether or not to shove handfuls of soil into his mouth. They had another playard set up in this part of the vineyard, but Aziraphale had always said that appreciation for the world had to start with appreciation of the ground beneath them. Whether or not his hooey had any truth to it was beside the point; Adam pouted terribly if he was denied the chance to toddle around while Crowley worked.

“Well, little beast, I think we’ve given our angel enough time to get dinner ready, and accept whatever sugar-coated monstrosity he’s ordered from Marie, haven’t we?”

Adam toddled over to Crowley’s side and handed him a small purple flower.

“Thank you,” Crowley replied, tucking it back behind his left ear. Adam held out his hands and Crowley hoisted him into the air. They were still working on actual language, but he understood the boy well enough to make do. “What do you think he’s got? Cake? Pastry?”

“Ba.”

“Hmm. You’re right. Probably something ridiculous. We have to save him from himself.”

Their little acre was furthest from the house, but a couple of twist and turns through the rows and they were cutting through to the veranda outside the kitchen in a miraculous fraction of the time it might take a human to do the same. Adam balanced on Crowley’s hip, occasionally reaching out to grab the grapes from the vines and pouting when Crowley gently drew his hand back.

“What do you think of bullying our angel into letting you help with the harvest this year?” Crowley offered.

Adam blew a raspberry and Crowley chuckled.

The chuckle died on his lips when he saw the smoke coming from the stove. He shouldered open the doors and dashed into the kitchen. After depositing Adam in his saucer—almost but not quite too small for him these days—he ran to the stove to scoop off the pan atop it.

Whatever dinner had been, it was charcoal now. He frowned. It wasn’t like Aziraphale to forget about food. Other basic necessities of life, occasionally, but never food. “Angel?!”

There was a shout of pain from the front, near the stairs. Crowley froze for a fraction of a moment, gaze swinging towards Adam. Fight or flight—instincts he should’ve been well over.

And then a familiar voice called out, “I knew it!”

Fuck.

_Flosiel_.

Crowley started towards Adam, hoping to grab him up and use whatever small amount of time they could manage to miracle themselves out; he had to trust Flosiel wouldn’t kill Aziraphale. He’d barely made it a step in the direction of the saucer when Aziraphale flew into the kitchen, tossed by an unseen force. He hit the far wall and crumpled to the ground. The left side of his back was soaked with blood, though Crowley couldn’t see the source of the injury. His first instinct was to fly to Aziraphale’s side, but the weight of Adam in his arms held him well back.

Flosiel followed moments later. He held a flaming sickle in his hand, and Crowley caught himself cowering away from it. The angel had threatened him with it before, but had never truly brought it to bear. Permanently killing each other would’ve kicked off hostilities between their respective sides before anyone was ready for them. But now? With what Crowley had done? He doubted there’d even be paperwork.

“Fancy meeting you here, Crawly,” Flosiel said. He held up a finger. “Be right with you.” He stalked over towards Aziraphale, twisting the sickle in his hand to turn the edge inwards. He grabbed Aziraphale around the collar and dragged him to his feet. Aziraphale—battered, bloody, beautiful Aziraphale—lolled his head to the side. Crowley met his eyes over Flosiel’s shoulder. His angel closed his eyes only a moment, long enough for Crowley to know—if he ran—all was forgiven.

“Go,” Aziraphale whispered.

“No!” Flosiel shook him hard, knocking his head against the wall. Crowley took a step forward, and Flosiel brandished his sickle in response. “You two can make this as difficult as you want. Please fight, I beg you. I’ve been rotting down here for all the useless little errands they have me running. But neither of you are getting away from this.”

Fight it was, then.

Snakebite-quick, Crowley grabbed the handle of the cast iron pan and flung it at Flosiel. The hot pan connected with the back of the angel’s head, sending blackened, boiling butter everywhere. He swung around, howling in response, his grip on Aziraphale loosening enough for the other angel to pull free.

In his saucer, Adam began sobbing.

Between heartbeats, faster than he’d ever managed before, Crowley shifted into his snake skin and slithered across the floor to wrap around Flosiel. His venom was enough to kill the angel—he’d done it in the past—and while it might only buy them a few moments while he reported back up to Heaven, it was a few moments more than they had. He barely managed to slither to the prick’s leg before Crowley had to release him and fling himself out of the way of Flosiels’ fucking sickle.

Aziraphale managed to push himself up, and grabbed Flosiel as the other angel lunged after Crowley. Flosiel hammered his fist across Aziraphale’s face, growling angrily when Aziraphale ignored the blow and wrapped him up in tight arms.

“Let go and I’ll leave you with the other one,” he snapped.

“Fuck you,” Aziraphale managed to cough out.

Flosiel elbowed Aziraphale in the sternum and, when the other angel bent over, kicked his instep and sent him tumbling to the ground. He lashed out with his heel, and landed a hard hit to Aziraphale’s temple. Aziraphale slumped down, unmoving.

Crowley shifted back and grabbed up the fallen frying pan.

“Really?” Flosiel demanded, blinking.

“Really,” Crowley agreed. He feinted towards Flosiel’s face, and, when the angel dodged to the side, clobbered the hand holding the sickle. It hit the ground and skidded away. Crowley twisted the pan in his hand and nailed Flosiel again, this time striking his temple hard enough to break bone.

Flosiel snapped back, but as he stumbled his wings broke free of the ether. They stopped his fall, and with a wide arc, he cracked one of them into Crowley’s nose and sent him flying. Crowley hit the ground next to Aziraphale, dazed.

“Enough,” Flosiel shouted. His voice resonated through the kitchen, bouncing off the walls loud enough to be deafening. Crowley clapped his hands over his ears, unsurprised to feel blood leaking between his fingers.

Adam was still crying, but the sound was far away.

Crowley started to rise, but before he could as much as get to his knees, Flosiel grabbed up his sickle and slammed the pommel down on Crowley’s head.

It was the last Crowley knew.

* * *

“Finally,” Flosiel said the word as a curse.

Aziraphale tried to push himself up, whimpering as the pain from his ruined wing and a thousand other small injuries tried to weigh him down. But no. _No, no, no._ He couldn’t let Flosiel get Adam.

Apparently happy to ignore Aziraphale’s attempts to rise, Flosiel crossed the kitchen, waving a hand to send the kitchen table crashing into the wall and out of his way, squishing the croquembouche beneath the shattered wood. He stopped in front of Adam’s saucer and leaned down.

“Time to stop playing house, hellspawn,” Flosiel said. He lifted Adam up under the arms, out of his saucer, and examined him. “Back to the humans, where you belong.”

Adam abruptly stopped crying and stared at Flosiel, unafraid to meet the angel’s half-crazed eyes.

Flosiel frowned, blinking and taken aback as though suddenly consumed with rather terrible acid reflux.

And then vanished.

The next thing Aziraphale knew, he was seated at the intact kitchen table, Adam in his lap, and looking at Crowley across the restored croquembouche. His left wing sat proudly back in its proper place, and his head no longer pounded with the force from Flosiel’s blows. 

“What,” Crowley said, flat. Aziraphale breathed a sigh of relief when he scanned the demon’s body for injuries and found none.

Aziraphale looked down at Adam, who was straining towards the profiteroles. And, next to them a small plant, tucked into a plain clay pot, sat on the table.

“Is that…” Aziraphale began.

“A geranium,” Crowley finished with a disbelieving chuckle. He stood and rounded the table, dropping into the chair next to Aziraphale and Adam. Adam held out his arms, but instead of lifting him away, Crowley settled himself into Aziraphale’s side, tucked up close. “Well done, little beast.”

“But is it Flosiel?”

“Looks like.”

“It’s alive?”

Crowley peered at the plant, which shook indignantly under the unwelcome scrutiny. “Yep. But I could put it into the mulcher if you want.”

“Do let’s not.” Aziraphale replied, wide-eyed. “Just in case.”

Crowley kissed Aziraphale’s temple, where Flosiel’s blow had connected. Aziraphale hummed in contentment, then blinked at himself in surprise for being in anyway content. Their home had been invaded. Their one-year-old son appeared to have saved the day. Their injuries were mended. All together, it had been a rather overwhelming evening.

“I’m sorry about dinner,” Aziraphale said, instead of voicing any of it.

“Not to worry,” Crowley assured him. “I think we still have some of the chicken left from last night.”

“Ah.” Aziraphale considered. “I’ll go fetch us a bottle of the ’95?”

“Nah. Make it the ’84. The minerality holds up better against the capers.”

Aziraphale’s entire body loosed a well-earned sigh. “I do love you, my dear.”

Crowley smirked. “Me too, angel.” He gently pulled Adam’s hand back from the croquembouche. “None of that before dinner.”

Adam and Aziraphale regarded him with identical wide-eyed sulks.

“Well,” Crowley conceded. “Maybe one.”


	7. Epilogue

_Nearly twelve years ago, Wine Spectator ran an article on the Château de l'Ange Abandonné. This little-known family winery in Provence had produced some of the most spectacular wines our editors at the time had the pleasure to taste, and as we introduce this year’s issue on Top Provence Wineries (check out our Top Recommendations starting on page 16 for a full write up), I made a point of visiting the winery while I was in France to see for myself. _

_I was greeted, at first, by such disorganized and unfriendly opening hours that I almost turned right back around to head home. I voiced this opinion in the village, and was told in no uncertain terms that my persistence would be worth the wait, and to try again the next day. I’m glad I waited. I was greeted at the door by the Head Vintner, A.Z. Fell, and his five-year-old son. My hand was quite solemnly shaken by the latter as the former led me through the chateau to their elegant and unpretentious tasting room, where I was provided with a generous flight of seven glasses. _

_“You’ll have to be honest about our new white blend,” Mr. Fell told me. “This is our first year bottling it. It’s Anthony’s pride and joy.”_

_“You and Adam are my pride and joy,” a providentially-arrived Anthony corrected, sweeping into the room. He looped an arm around Mr. Fell’s neck and pecked his cheek. “But the white’s not bad.” He grabbed their son up to greet him, which is when I knew I had to write about my experience. Though the Château’s wines aren’t available commercially, the sense of easy family comfort which lasted throughout my entire visit made, along with their superb offerings, showcasing this winery an easy decision regardless._

_My full write up of the wines are on page 18, but I want to take a moment to pay some special attention to their new white. A blend of bourboulenc and viognier, this incredibly fresh offering grabbed me with it’s wonderful citrusy notes which cut nicely through the rich mouthfeel of the viognier. Notes of orange blossom, candied lemon rind, and a delicate honeysuckle tickled my senses, balancing the low acidity perfectly. _

_Adam, aforementioned five-year-old, offered me a few of his cheese crackers to complement my tasting. They paired best with the rosés. _

<hr>

Aziraphale frowned over the top of the magazine. “I mean, of course it’s very flattering. He was obviously enraptured by your wine, my dear. But I do worry it’s going to cause an uptick in visitors.”

“Most wineries would kill for this sort of press, you realize.”

“Most wineries are looking to sell their wine. Last time an article like this ran, I gave away almost an entire decade’s worth of rosé”

“Well,” Crowley murmured, leaning over to kiss Aziraphale’s neck. “You’re the one who says wine should be experienced. I think the rosés you made in the late Nineties are almost ready to go.”

“I suppose so. Maybe we could open one tonight and check?”

“Lovely thought, angel.”

Crowley returned to his seat to sip at his coffee. Aziraphale placed the magazine down on the table and gazed across at Adam, who was diligently applying himself to a drawing of the vineyard. Or, at least, Aziraphale assumed it as the vineyard based on the nearly-straight brown and squiggly green lines on the page.

He finished a few minutes later and jumped up from his seat to present it to Crowley. “Here, Papa.”

“Very good, this,” Crowley said, slinging an arm across Adam’s shoulders. “What’s that, then?” he asked, pointing to a small brown oblong near the bottom of the page.

“That’s my dog when you let me have one,” Adam replied. “I would pick up all his poop, and teach him tricks and he’d help me hunt rats in the cellar.”

Aziraphale blinked, shocked. “We never have rats in the cellar!”

“But we might. That’s why a dog is good.” Argument thus made, Adam turned wide, pleading eyes at Crowley.

“We’ll talk about a dog when you’re a few years older,” Crowley promised.

“At length, I should think,” Aziraphale murmured.

“For now, why don’t you go get dressed. Baba is going to be taking you off to _maternelle_.”

Adam’s eyes widened, a guileless grin spreading across his face. “Can we take your car, Baba?!”

“If it’s all right with Papa.”

“Ugh,” Crowley whined, “Yes. Just don’t tell me about it.”

Adam whooped and half-ran from the room, nearly braining himself on the doorframe in his haste to get out. Once his footsteps had thundered up the stairs, Aziraphale stood and moved to Crowley’s side to examine the picture.

“It’s a very small dog,” he commented mildly.

Crowley hummed under his breath and grabbed Aziraphale’s hand, brushing a kiss against his knuckles. They remained pressed tightly together, gazing at the picture, until Adam returned to prod them into beginning the day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has left kudos and encouraging words! I've enjoyed reading every single one of them!


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